I’m sure any self-respecting skate expert would have left them on the shelf behind the crusty helmets and old skis. But how could I resist them? The nineties-style green and purple that evokes memories of every local skating rink in the world that somehow seems to be frozen three to four decades in the past. The joy of a Goodwill gem. The memories of learning to rollerblade on my driveway when I was five while my mom watched from a lawn chair.

Needless to say, I bought them. 

A few years later I found myself in an unexpected place. It was the start of my senior year of college, and I no longer had the job, relationship, or academic intensity that I had experienced the last three years. I was drifting in vocational limbo, and I found it oddly liberating.

Naturally, I renewed my interest in roller blading.

One of my favorite days of that fall I still remember vividly. I had friends in town for the weekend, and we set our alarms for seven a.m. to go blading in the sunrise. Half asleep, wearing matching jerseys, and scuffling around in the parking lot across the street from my house, the sun sifted softly onto our shoulders. Everything feels gentler at that time of daylight.

Later that day we went on a three mile adventure to pick up coffee, Pringles, and frozen pizza. Although there was food in the house, it was so much more satisfying to complete our food acquisition entirely with our blades on. (Also we had to pick up a can of Pringles that were stamped with the tantalizing promise that we COULD win). Somewhere along the way, we even chased a turkey down a side street.

I remember that October as a time of my life when I felt a very loose grip on who I was and what I wanted from life. But I did know for sure that I loved roller blading. Picking up speed down hills, jumping over speed bumps, and zigzagging up streets. It all came so much easier to my pigeon-toed feet than walking ever will. So I convinced my friends to lace up and join me whenever I had the chance.

Recently I remembered this interest in skating. I had become mired down by my job. Sometimes I spend ten hours a day at school, and leave feeling like my personality has been whittled down to little more than a teaching machine. It feels that I live and breathe in order to coerce students into caring about English and stories. My actual identity as Susannah sometimes seems hazy at best.

In an effort to counteract this foggy sense of self, whenever I get home and the sun hasn’t yet gone down, I lace up my crappy retro skates and do a lap or two around the lake near my apartment. Rumbling along the asphalt, I pray for a day when the sunset creeps across the glassy surface in mesmerizing streaks unhindered by an amalgamation of Michigan clouds. How many laps can I get around the lake before it’s so dark I’ll skate right into the water?

When I was a kid, hobbies didn’t seem all that important, just something to write in a second grade journal entry. Now I am racing the sunset down M-57 in my tiny purple car so that I can get in some time on my rollerblades and spending way too much time watching roller skating videos on YouTube.

Best six bucks I ever spent.

Susannah Boersma

Susannah currently lives in New Jersey and works as a 7th grade ELA teacher in East Harlem. When she is not teaching or writing, she can be found exploring independent bookstores, going backpacking, and trying to roller-skate on all the cool trails in the city. She is also recently experienced in the art of citrus skunk repellent (I know you’re impressed).