I Can't Turn

This statement is not entirely true. I can do a two foot turn from forward to backwards with some fair degree of skill. As I like to say at home, "I can do a 33 Turn!"

But of course, there are no 33 Turns in Real Skating. They are yet another figment of my imagination. I knew I had turns coming, but I was content to go Forwards and Backwards like I was on a perpetual Lazy River. "Turns can come later," I thought. "When I'm ready. My coaches will know."

Well, apparently either my Coaches are slacking off or I am, because I had Three Turns and Mohawks thrown at me in quick succession, and both of which were disastrous.

Why is this such a hard concept for me? Well, think of your skate blade. It's long and thin, and it likes to go forward and back. He simply doesn't support side to side motion. It's like your car. The tires are aligned in such a way that he can go forward and backward, with gentle turns.

Turn too fast, and you get this kind of disaster:



And it didn't help that Coach Snape was saying, "You'd be surprised at how easy this is. It can't help but happen."

Yeah, well, once again my Brain Stem started freaking out. I'd line up a turn, get on that FO edge, get my arms ready, and I'd try to swing around, and I'd think, "YOU'RE GONNA DIE!" And I'd just stay there, paralyzed.

I ended that class in severe frustration.

Okay, semi-privates are next. "Master Shifu will surely not do this to me yet," I think.  So we warm up, head on the ice, start normally with stroking and crossovers and life is good.

Then Master Shifu busts out a Mohawk. "We'll do this on the wall," he says.

Oh good, I think. I like the wall.

So we do this on the wall, and I'm wrapping my head around the mechanics of the thing, when he skates away from the wall.

Please don't ask me to do that out there, I'm begging inwardly.

But he does, and it's disaster. And once again I get that paralysis.

Now, bear in mind the lovely lady I'm working with grasped this right off the bat. She's doing mohawks and three turns, and I've been put back on the wall where I'm grabbing the rails for dear life. Every time I try to step away from the wall, I get paralyzed and think "Why can't I do this?"

Eventually I get so frustrated I start to shake, and it's over. Call the lesson done, I have forks sticking all out of me. Master Shifu insists that I'll get it eventually, but with Snape saying, "Oh, it's so easy," and Lady getting it so handily, I feel awful.

I come back later on, where I try again at Public Skate. I get a 2.1 turn on my good side, a 1.5 turn on my bad side, and that Mohawk is nowhere. I try it on the boards, and once again I'm clinging for purchase as my skate slides out from under me, or I land the T wrong and trip myself.

I've taken a few bad falls and come away with some pretty nice bruises. As it turns out, I can take the black and blue kind. What I can't take is a bruise to my ego, and I think that stings more than anything.