Tornado

Once a month, Tornado’s play school does an hour of skating before class. Since I don’t work and his mom and dad do, I get to go with him. It’s a little one on one quality time.

The first time, he didn’t want anything to do with skating and I ended up pushing him around the rink looking for interesting things on the ice. There just aren’t that many interesting things on an ice rink because the zamboni driver makes a point of cleaning it pretty regularly. We spent the better part of the hour walking around the rink and opening and shutting the doors from the player’s bench. It was fun in its own way.

The second time we went skating; he was a little more into it but had some trouble keeping on his feet. Skates can be tricky things when you are first learning the art. We slowly moved around the rink, falling every now and then and sometimes he would just lay there on his back looking at the ceiling for a few minutes. The ceiling is actually pretty interesting; with the odd puck stuck in the insulation and black scuff marks from where pucks bounced off of the ceiling. There was some opening and closing doors as well.

By the time we did our third skate, he didn’t want very much to do with me unless of course I was summoned. There was some improvement, but I wouldn’t be counting on a NHL contract any time soon.

Today, he shot out of the change room, grabbed his support and raced around the rink. He was on fire and I may have to take back that NHL comment. I couldn’t keep up with him. Mind you, his dad had been skating a few times with him over the holidays and I wasn’t wearing skates. Pretty soon, I will be drinking coffee and watching him skate from the stands, as it should be.

I tried to take my skates this time, but that just didn’t work out very well. I haven’t skated for years and years, probably since my kids were small. I don’t know why, it is fun, good exercise, very Canadian and it gets you out of the house in the winter. I think part of it is that I used to like skating on outdoor rinks and the winters haves been very mild for about fifteen years. So mild in fact that it was almost impossible to keep ice on the rinks for any length of time. The Chinooks that I love do have a negative side.

My skates have been hanging in the garage for many years and this morning I took them down and dusted them off to try them on, just to make sure they still fit. When I undid the laces, I noticed there were sunflower seeds and bits of other stuff inside. I guess the mice had used my skates as a delicatessen. I did clean it out, and when I stuck my foot inside I found that my feet had spread over the years. To tell the truth, the skates were never very comfortable, I just dealt with pain better when I was younger. So…no skating for me today.

Now, I have to decide if I want to take advantage of the climate change and buy a new or new…ish pair of skates. It is still fun, good exercise, very Canadian and it gets you out of the house in the winter, but I’m just not sure I would actually go skating. I will keep my eye out for deals on skates and maybe this will be the year I actually lose the weight I need to. Maybe I will just be able to keep up with Tornado the next time we go skating.