I grew up in Canada. It's cold and snowy in the winter. People here love hockey and winter sports. Hockey is almost a form of religion. It's common for young boys and girls to start learning to skate and play hockey from a very young age. This is so much so that rinks and rink time are in perpetually short supply - something that brings grief to municipal governments everywhere. So, what about me? I learned to skate and play hockey from a very young age, right? No.
I was a very shy kid right from the get-go. I guess that this was just the way my personality was wired. I didn't choose to be shy and anxious, it's just the way I was. Re-enforcing this was the fact that I was born to older parents and had two siblings that were significantly older than me. My arrival was almost akin to the start of second family, this time with more or less an only child. With no siblings of similar age and a deeply shy personality, I wasn't all that motivated to go out and do things like play sports. My much older parents didn't seem all that interested in putting me in sports either. I'm not sure why but I can only conclude that they had already done that with the older children and were simply too tired or too uninterested to do so when I came along. The result of all this? I didn't learn to skate or play hockey from a young age. This would have consequences for me later on in a hockey-obsessed society.
Enter elementary school in the early 1980's. Part of the physical education curriculum involved field trips to the rink. This would be fun right? What I discovered was that no, this wasn't going to be fun at all. Most of the other kids were competent skaters and I was not. Compounding this was the fact that my parents prided themselves deeply on their ability to stretch a dollar. Their birth during the Great Depression and their coming of age during World War II were things that instilled in them the need to not spend money on anything that might seem frivolous. This included buying me skates. By the early 80's, hockey skate technology had advanced a lot since the late 1960's when my elder siblings were my age, and they were learning to skate. Boy's hockey skates at that time were made from leather as opposed to the newer molded skates that were popular when I was a kid. So, not only did I have no skating skills, but I had to wear very unhip, hand-me-down skates. It was humiliating! The other boys made it clear that I was not up to par.
Not only did I have to endure this once but multiple times throughout the early elementary school years. I never did learn how to skate well as a kid. I was so uncomfortable that I even started to hate the smell and sounds of the rinks that they would take us to. When I was about ten years old, my older brother took me to an outdoor rink and attempted to teach me how to skate. Unfortunately, by that time I had developed a bad attitude from all of the humiliation that I had already experienced. I just wasn't open-minded enough to give learning a proper go.
From this point on, I would occasionally attempt to go out on an outdoor rink, but I stunk! This resulted in me being excluded from events at the outdoor rink that was just across the street from my parents' house. I tried to play in a pickup hockey game when I was thirteen, but I just couldn't stay on my feet. I appreciated that some of the older guys were trying to build up my confidence, but it just wasn't working - the kids my own age were very competitive and demanded more than I was able to give. I put my skates away and never looked at them again.
Fast forward thirty years... I'm a dad with two girls. I'm still living in Canada. I'm supposed to teach my kids how to skate and play hockey. I'm supposed to want to go to the rink and be excited about teaching these little people how to put on their skates and start floating around the ice. Ugh... I'm not capable of it. I don't have the skills. I still don't like the smells and sounds of the rinks. What am I supposed to do? I really don't want to face up to this. I don't want to relive my childhood humiliations all over again as a man in my forties.
My brother-in-law was a fairly accomplished hockey player in his youth. He offered to take my daughters out and teach them how to skate. My wife and I gladly took up the offer. Yet, I felt absolutely terrible about this. I didn't have the skills nor the self-confidence to go to the rink let alone teach my kids anything. I went along a few times to the rink (I even bought a pair of skates to give it a try), but I always felt depressed and terrible after being at the rink. It was so bad that I decided to stop going altogether. That is, until last night...
I did it. I went to the Doug Wickenheiser Arena at Regina's Northwest Leisure Centre with my kids, my brother-in-law, and my wife. We all took our skates. We arrived and I wasn't sure how I was going to feel or what I was going to do. I braced myself for a wave of depression and anxiety. I laced up my skates, fearing the worst. But this isn't what happened.
I walked out onto the ice and proceeded to do a few laps around the rink, always staying close to the boards just in case I needed to grab on for dear life! Man was I unstable! It was tough for me to keep my balance. I was constantly thinking that I was going to fall flat on my back. But it didn't happen. I stayed upright. I did several laps. Eventually, I went off the ice because the rink became quite crowded, and I was certain that I was going to get mowed down! Also, my feet were killing me. I left the ice but ultimately, I was feeling pretty good about trying. If the rink hadn't been so busy, I would probably have stayed out there longer and started the process of building up my skills.
I thought about this a lot last night. I have felt so bad about my lack of skating skills and how I was so humiliated as a kid. I am tired of feeling this way. I hope that I can find a less busy rink to go to in the future where I can start to hone my skills more. Better late than never...
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