Danse Macabre.

It's been a few months since the Olympics, and thanks to the over-zealous administrators of the Yu-Na Kim Facebook page who send daily updates of her TIME 100 placement to my news feed, my desire to set toe pick on ice has not yet subsided. Quite the opposite, in fact. With every new YouTube montage that I feel strangely compelled to click on, I want nothing more than to hear the crisp sounds of blades scratching up the cool, glassy surface. The crisp sounds of my blades, that is.

After months of wishful thinking, I finally have a free night, so I head on down to Yerba Buena and lace up the 15 year old relics that are my skates. Worn S.P. Teri boots with worn polish mounted atop equally worn Professional blades. Dull blades that barely hold their edges. A few laps around the ice, and I can hear my breathing getting heavier, asthmatic. Except I don't have asthma anymore. I'm just plain out of shape. 

I run through the arsenal of singles - waltz, salchow, toe loop, loop, flip, lutz - in that order. The axel, I avoid. 

A sit spin, a pseudo-layback, and two failed camel spins later, my head is woozy. As I dizzily stumble out of each spin, all I see are streaks of movement. It takes a few crossovers to regroup. 

I recognize the regulars - the gay men that are still there from years past. I wonder if they recognize me, but it's been a while. But damn this shyness that keeps me waiting for that glimmer of recognition, that wave of hello.

Now on to the more artistic elements. My spirals are perfectly perpendicular, but hardly spectacular. So much for flexibility. I should've stretched more.

After spending twenty minutes by the sidelines, I exit the ice early. I'm much too tired to even glide leisurely laps around the rink. I've got snow cascading down the side of my left leg from over-rotating and crashing down from a series of double salchows. My heel is blistered, and my knees are throbbing from impact. I feel like throwing up. 

As I'm driving home, utterly spent, I can only think about one thing. All I want is a chewy triple chocolate chunk cookie. That's all I want. But Trader Joe's is closed for the day. Curses.


The thing is, ice skating is really only good in theory. I realize this as I'm standing in front of the mirror surveying the damage - the reddish swelling that has sprung up just under my hip. The reddish swelling that will overnight blossom into a spotted, plum-colored bruise the size of a tennis ball.