We get inside and pay the admission. They give you this coded card, which is everything, from skate and locker rental to getting on and off the ice… Lose it, and you will be shelling out another 45 hryvnia to get a new one.
Mari would LOVE to skate with us, however, she is facing arthroscopic surgery when we get home and must be left watching from the sidelines. I have a great deal of empathy for her with my own bad knees, ankle, back, etc…
Advise from Mari? “Don’t do anything stupid!”
Too late.
Let us start by saying that timing is everything… We get inside the rink and get our skates just in time for the ice to be cleared of wayward skaters and the Zamboni to come out and groom the ice. So while we wait for the ice to set, we put on our skates. Much can be said about the ankle support of hockey skates, however wearing bootie socks to go ice skating was mistake #1 (some chafing, but surprisingly, no blisters).
The first lap away from the boards… Push and glide, then all of a sudden… Hands on my back and the sensation of being pushed… I can handle this… Don’t do anything to cost balance and fall. The next thought was “how long is this train going to get?” The push lasted just a lap or so, then it’s on to more conventional means. Vera, Olya & I manage to make several more laps around the ice as we watch others fall around us then pick themselves up, laughing the whole time. My ultimate goal is not to fall (and make a fool of myself). Perhaps this was mistake number 3… Not falling… Maybe the true goal here actually IS to fall and pick ourselves back up to continue on. This is where the fun REALLY is…
2 comments:
How fun! Is the rink in Odessa? Last time I went ice skating some young kid flew by me knocking me on my face! He came back and said sorry though. The problem I had was I could not get up. Ice skating was so much easier 20 years ago!
It sounds like you are having some good bonding times. That's wonderful. I hope you make it home for Christmas.
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