The roller rink
cramped ticket-taking closet, all
heavy doors and a small hole in the glass like this place were a nightclub
long list of posted rules for the “skaters”. When was the last time
I heard a person describe another as a skater?
…remind me, avril.
Side-skip through the turnstile with my handstamp
I recall, all too well
Changing out of my boots in the gaggle of girls from school and winter-coat moms
a bead animals kit for the birthday girl in a gift bag
self-consciously trading in the roller skates for a pair of in-lines.
Jam my sock feet and forest-smelling jeans into the scratched up rentals
and speed off into the gloom in the back of the rink, my blue-and-white checked flannel shirt fluttering in the self-created breeze
…wobble along to the Shaggy on the radio like the coolest thing around.
That’s me gawkily vulture-necking around the fringe of Stephanie’s table at Sprite and Pizza Time.
I was never in the center.
It didn’t matter.
The eight year old in my charge leads me beneath the false-mediterranean balcony, I take her coat
help her into some pink and white plastic skates.
the immortal Roller-Roo smiles out from a fresco on the false-mediterranean wall
hasn’t changed his Hawaiian shirt in years.
The scent of butter and shoe disinfectant mingles with the sno-cone syrups
and a song comes on that was a hit when I was eight.
A row of roughed up video games crowd the perimeter
Sporting the same hot cars and terrible odds as always
promising tickets and prizes, maybe
to all those whose sense of probability is still governed by optimism
and whose cash flow is governed by Parent-Or-Guardian.
I scan the carpet, all stripes and triangles and sticky smelling of grape
to see if maybe someone lost a token under a machine?
stray popcorn and stale dust bunnies.
My best efforts could never procure more than a googly-eyed finger puppet or an eraser shaped like a fish
while the coveted inflatable saxophone continued to gloat from its perch on the wall behind the counter.
Auntie would roll her eyes and say we could have got twenty for a quarter at the dollar store
…but the phrase “this is a racket” has never been uttered by an eight year old.
A stuffed sentinel Santa beneath the disco ball on a dark wood-paneled stage
surveys the scattering of skaters on the floor.
Here’s a dad-and-son team of talent
there’s a dreadlocked lesbian couple doing roller derby stunts on electric green wheels
one determined dark-eyed four year old shuffles bent against the wind on her yellow My First Skates
A chubby, spiky-headed boy wobbles, terrified
his chubby mother floating and carving backwards effortless
armed with a cameraphone to document the occasion.
The eight year old ditches me for her the new best friends she just met
People probably think I’m her mom
all forest-smelling jeans, and farm-arms.
Now the flannel shirt is brown-and-white checked.
After a moments’ hesitation I opt for the in-lines
and cruise alone in circles
and feel the self-created breeze on my face.
.. I’m not the coolest person here.
It doesn’t matter.
Abbe Hamilton Archive 