I got to Watch!

I show up early on Saturdays, because sometimes we luck out. Today was just such a day. Lessons on the Big Ice plus an additional 15 minutes because Gordon copped out and Ms V neglected to call Coach. Whoops!

Oh well. I shipped off Stitch and chatted with Fab Skater's mom who was Ice Monitor that morning. I explained about not being able to watch, and she suggested I grab a book from the stand and "pretend to read." Ah ha! So I perused the titles, knowing full well I wasn't going to be doing any reading. (I forgot my beads, boo. Two hours wasted.)

There were many good titles fit for a skating mom at the Rink:

"Silent Assassin"
"Prepare for Rage"
"American Psycho"

I chose "Total Control" and headed in.

Stitch saw right through my subterfuge, giving me wry looks as he flubbed through Spirals. Coach kept him working on the basics, not bothering with jumps today. This is fine. He needs to get a solid practice routine going, and this is what I asked for. We can try again tonight on public ice. I talked with Mini Fabulous' mom for awhile, she seems pretty nice.
"Your daughter is way cool, I love to watch her."
"Oh," says Mini Fab's mom. "She makes so many mistakes, sometimes I just turn away."
Wow, really? I never notice any mistakes this kid makes.

He got a full forty five minutes before the next girl, whom I will call Mistress Awesome, arrived. Stitch wanted to go get some breakfast and his allowance from Walgreen's (I gave him oatmeal before we left but apparently this is not enough.) So we walked over to the store.

Back at the rink, he had his muffin and milk, I had a diet coke and we watched the Power class do some relay games. It was really fun; for one of them they had four groups, evenly numbered. One skater races to the end and back, grabs another skater. Two skaters race to the end and back, grab another skater. Three, four, five, then six skaters race to the end and back. Even Stitch was cheering. But when the rink goes from loud cheers to dead silence in a second flat, something is wrong. Someone fell, and tears aren't normal for this class. She was okay, just needed a moment to compose herself, and the races went on while she rested. Surprisingly, Other Kid didn't kill himself, but he was markedly slower and nearly did an incredible flying backwards dive.

It's really starting to bug me, especially when I watch that kid do a Spiral or a Spin. It's just non-existent. Why hasn't someone noticed? Why is he here? Whatever.

It was nice to watch. In lessons, you hit high points where there seems to be something new learned and picked up every ten minutes, and then there are lulls where they do nothing new at all and even the basics seem difficult and tiring. Stitch is in a lull at the moment. But it's a good lull, he's comfortable even though he's complaining every step of the way. After every bitch session, he looks at me as though to ask what I plan on doing about it. Keep skating, you're good at it, is my only reply. (And the alternative is Mario Brothers. Nope.)

We're off again tonight and holiday tomorrow. While I'm not really religious, we did dye eggs. You have to dye eggs. And eat jellybeans.