Forgetting to Be Scared (Roller Derby Makes Me Brave #6)

me after my first public roller derby scrimmage as part of westmoreland roller derby's violet femmes home team

This is the sixth installment of "Roller Derby Makes Me Brave," an ongoing series in which I chronicle my journey into roller derby. (You can read the whole series or the individual posts.)

The Friday after Thanksgiving I felt more like the girl who sits on the couch in her pajamas and favorite soft-as-a-blanket cardigan, drinking tea and reading than I felt like the girl who shimmies into a pair of black tights, laces up her roller skates, and straps on a helmet to skate in an oval and knock down similarly dressed girls. But by late afternoon I had pulled my post-Thanksgiving ass off of the couch, showered, applied more eye makeup than I normally wear, hiked my tights up under a black miniskirt, and headed off to Westmoreland Roller Derby's Black Friday Bout.

This was my third public scrimmage, and I realized that I'm woefully behind in telling you about how we got to this point in the Roller Derby Makes Me Brave saga.

When last we left our derby heroine, Punchberry JAM, she had just attended her first practice in full gear. She was learning how to fall and how to get back up, literally and metaphorically.

That was last spring. I went to a few practices, and then to a few more, each time surprised with myself for sticking with this wild adventure.

Some time during the last six months I confided this truth to a non-derby friend:

"I haven't stopped being scared," I said. "I'm pretty much scared every time I stand up on skates."

"But you keep showing up," she said.

That's true. April turned to May turned to June, and I was still showing up -- and still skating on a terrible pair of Cobra skates. Their limitations were becoming obvious.

Now, let me be clear: Good skates don't exactly make the skater, but good skates do make skating easier. Wheeling around on a pair of toy skates with cheap plastic wheels and crap bearings while everyone else zooms past on bona fide speed skates can dishearten even the most determined derby girl. I couldn't do some of the most basic maneuvers, such as propelling myself forward with all eight wheels on the floor, not even when I moved my legs and hips as I was shown. I was skating twice as hard as anyone else and going half as fast. I hoped to the derby gods that these shortcomings were at least in part due to the shitty skates. But I worried: What if the real problem was me? The limitations of my body mingled with the limitations of my skates so that I had no idea which was which.

I needed new skates stat, but I dragged my feet on getting them. I was having trouble deciding on a pair, to put it mildly. Before derby I had no idea how many decisions one must make when buying roller skates.

What kinds of decisions? Read on if you care about that kind of thing, or skip the next paragraph if you don't.

Okay, so you wanna buy skates for roller derby. What kind of boot do you want? Leather or synthetic? What's the right size and style for short, wide feet with flat arches? Do you want nylon, aluminum, or titanium plates? What about the trucks? (Who knew there was something called a truck on a skate?) You could go with the standard 10-degree angle trucks or the swanky 45-degree angles. And what the hell is a "short forward mount," anyway? Then there are the wheels. Harder wheels go faster and are denoted by higher durometer numbers. (Go ahead, look up the word durometer. I don't think anyone but derby girls and plastic manufacturers use it.) Softer wheels have more grip and lower numbers. The bigger you are, the harder the wheel you can skate on, but if you're not very steady on your feet yet, don't go too hard or you'll slide around. And all of this depends on what kind of floor you'll be skating on. Concrete skates different than sport court skates different than wood. Okay, got your wheels picked out? Great. What about bearings for inside those wheels? Get at least ABEC-7, or go to Swiss bearings if you want really smooth rolling action. And you'll need some toe stops, of course. What about an extra set of laces? How about a toecap to protect the front of the boot from getting scuffed? Need any knee socks with your order? You got all that?

Yes, finally, I got all that. I tend to research things to death. I'm great at gathering and synthesizing information, but that process is also my Achilles' heel: I get trapped in analysis paralysis. For weeks I agonized over which skates to get. I wanted to make sure I bought the best possible ones for me. But something else was at play in my dilly-dallying: As long as I had crap skates, I could blame them for my crap skating. This was happening on a subconscious level, of course. (And as I've said, skates do not the skater make. I've seen derby girls skate like the wind in bad rental skates.)

old skates and new skates

I wore the hell out of those Cobra skates. I wore them until something came loose inside the wheels and I was afraid to skate on them anymore. This happened right before I finally ordered a new pair, which meant I sat out a few weeks of practice while I waited for my shiny new skates to arrive.

(In case you care about this kind of thing, I got Sure Grip Rebel leather boots, Avenger DA45 plates, QUBE Juice Abec 7 bearings, pink Fugitive wheels, Carerra stops, pink-and-black plaid laces, and pink toe covers, though I'm now skating on black Radar Flat Outrageous wheels with Swiss bearings and have switched to black laces and black toe covers. Next up on the never-ending gear list is a set of Gumdrop toe stops.)

At the same time that I was waiting for my new skates, I was also spending several hours a week in physical therapy for my knee, which had decided to go haywire with all of this newfangled movement and exercise. And then I went to the west coast for two weeks in July, missing more practices and the league's first public scrimmage.

By the time August rolled around, my knee was on the mend and I had new skates -- and I was still scared every time I stood up on them. I hadn't skated much for about a month, and it showed. I wasn't exactly starting over, but I was scrambling to catch up and keep up. The good news is that I could now propel myself with all eight wheels on the floor, and although I was still slower than most of the others, I was definitely skating faster. I finally felt like I had all of the external pieces in order. Now I had to bring myself up to speed.

And that's where I am now: still working to bring myself up to speed. I go to practice twice a week and try to skate at least one other day. I've played in three public home scrimmages plus one closed scrimmage with the Ohio Valley Roller Girls.

This journey has been an up-and-down kind of adventure so far. I suspect that's how it will always be. I've lost a few weeks of training here and there due to laziness or new injuries. I've had nights where I've sobbed most of the way home after practice because I'm so frustrated with myself. I've also left practices bursting with joy and a kind of exhilaration I've never known before.

james & me at my first boutI'm still nowhere near where I want to be as a roller derby girl, but I'm not where I started, either. After the Black Friday bout, I wasn't feeling the best about my performance. But then at the after-party, the bench manager asked me how my knee was doing after its latest rebellion, and I could honestly say that it's much stronger than it's been. "That's great," she said. "I'm glad you can keep skating. You've come so far." I don't know if she had any idea how much I needed to hear those words (though it wouldn't surprise me if she did).

I've been making note (sometimes in my head, sometimes in my journal) of these little "wins," no matter how small they might seem on the surface: when a teammate says "good job"; when I don't fall down after a bigger girl shoulder checks me; when I do fall but get up quickly; when I figure out a strategy and communicate it to my team; when I master -- or even attempt -- a new skating skill.

I'm keeping track of these moments because one by one, they're helping me to be a little more confident. I get off the couch. I pull on the tights. I lace up the skates. I slap on the helmet.

I had good practice the other week. I was having a blast out there on the track. I felt strong and capable. And that's when it hit me: I had finally forgotten to be scared.

{photo credits: photo of me by james simpson; roster photo and photo of james and me by d.j. coffman, a.k.a. the secretary of skate; skates photo by me}

The First Practices (Roller Derby Makes Me Brave #5)

This is the fifth installment of "Roller Derby Makes Me Brave," an ongoing series in which I chronicle my journey into roller derby. (You can read the whole series or the individual posts.)

me in my new helmet, straight out of the box

On the evening after April Fools' Day, I showed up at the practice rink with nothing but a knot in my stomach and what I imagine was a fresh-meat-in-the-headlights look in my eyes. This was no joke.

As promised, Sue Zee Haymaker had brought me a pair of Cobra skates that she'd bought at a flea market. She'd paid $2.00 for them. I gave her $2.50. Compared to good skates, these were awful, but they were an enormous improvement over the rentals I'd been using, and I was thrilled to have them.

Since I didn't have any protective gear for that first practice, I didn't do much but skate around and watch the other girls do drills. By now I was staying on my feet most of the time, which was a considerable improvement, given that just three weeks earlier I could barely stand on wheels. But by the end of that first practice, going from standing to skating proved to be a problem. My brain told my body to move, but my feet apparently didn't get the memo. My upper body swayed forward while my legs stayed still, and down I went on my left knee.

In that moment I vowed that I wouldn't get on roller skates again without knee pads. So by the next practice a week later, I had the full monty of gear: knee gaskets, knee pads, padded shorts, elbow pads, mouthguard, and helmet.

the palm bruise, one week later

Well, I had the full gear monty minus one thing: Wrist guards. The pair I'd ordered online were too small and had to be exchanged. I didn't have them in time for that second practice, but I skated anyway. This was a mistake, because I fell and slammed my palm into the court. And it was in that moment, of course, that I vowed never to skate without knee pads and wrist guards.

By practice number three I finally had every single piece of gear that I needed. This meant that I could participate on a whole new level. And this made my third practice feel like my first.

We started that practice with a falling drill. Knowing how to fall well is a key part of roller derby. I don't know if there's any other sport in which "Nice fall!" is meant as a true compliment. You feel smart and powerful when you fall well. It's not that you want to fall, but you have to accept that it's going to happen, and you need to know how to do it as safely and painlessly as possible. Plus -- and this is the real kicker -- you need to not fear it. This mental aspect is much harder to master than the physical aspects of falling safely.

Strap eight wheels onto your feet, and everything in your body and mind screams at you: Don't fall! For the love of your beautiful bones, don't fall! You must overcome this. You have to trust that all of this gear you're wearing will work if you just follow the instructions.

As I stood in the drill line, realizing that I was going to have to execute a physical activity while a bunch of other women watched, everything in my mind and heart screamed at me: Don't do this! For the love of your pride, don't do this!

my $2.50 Cobra skatesWhat terrified me more than the idea of learning how to fall was the idea of other people seeing me learn how to fall. I have spent my entire adult life avoiding situations in which I might make a physical fool of myself. Yet here I was, a grown woman engaged in a voluntary, recreational activity, and I felt like the chubby, out-of-shape girl in eighth grade gym class waiting in line for one of the stations of the President's Physical Fitness Test. Do you remember those? I hated gym class in an average week, but my loathing and level of humiliation reached a new level during testing time. I don't think I ever failed the test, but I certainly couldn't do enough pull-ups or sit-ups to feel good about myself. I didn't run fast, and I couldn't run for very long without getting winded. I think I managed to do fairly well on the standing long jump, but that was little consolation for my overall mediocre performance. The worst part was having the other girls watch while you tried to execute the task. I don't remember anyone ever mocking or insulting me, but they didn't have to. I was doing that silently in my head all by myself.

We grow up, we change. We try new things, we shift perspectives. We get brave, we get hurt. Decades pass, and we're not the same people. Yes, all of these things are true, but we're also still 12-years-old, stuck in the purgatory between childhood and adulthood, old enough to know better and too afraid to know how. (Child self, meet shadow self.) 

Everyone else skated out in groups of four. Skate, fall, slide. But there was an odd number of us that night, and instead of adding myself to a group, I ended up having to go by myself. I felt sick. I felt the kind of panic that makes you give-up before you try. The back-down-the-ladder-on-the-high-dive panic. The sing-too-softly-on-the-choir-solo-auditions panic. The turn-your-head-the-other-way-when-he-tries-to-kiss-you panic. The I-want-this-so-badly-I-can-hardly-stand-it panic.

Sometimes the shadow self triumphs. Eventually you step off the high dive, sing your heart out, close your eyes and soften your lips. Eventually you skate, fall, slide. And no one laughs or points or shakes their head. The next group lines up, and the next, and then you again. Skate, fall, slide. It looks easy, but there's not much in the world that's more difficult than letting yourself fall and getting back up again, no matter who's looking.

My Shadow Self (Roller Derby Makes Me Brave #4)

This is the fourth installment of "Roller Derby Makes Me Brave," an ongoing series in which I chronicle my journey into roller derby. (You can read the whole series or the individual posts.)

I saw the flyer near the door of the local coffee shop: Roller Derby is coming to Westmoreland County! A shot of espresso-scented adrenaline hit me. Roller derby! Here!

It had been nearly two years since I'd attended my first bout, and as alluring as the idea of derby had been, I knew I wouldn't commit to the 80-mile round trip to the rink where Pittsburgh's Steel City Derby Demons practice and play. So the idea of becoming a roller derby girl simmered in the back of my subconscious, always on the periphery of desire, a  shadow identity just out of reach. But here was a reminder of my shadow self, staring back at me in black and white. I tore off one of the flyer's paper fringe strips printed with an email address, and headed out into the February cold to my car.

That night, I sent an email asking for more details. Atomic Bombino, the league organizer and veteran derby girl, emailed back. The first official practice was happening that very week. I didn't go. I didn't go the next week, or the next. My shadow self kept telling people that I was going to try roller derby, but the other half of me didn't really believe it. I kept saying it, and kept putting it off. It took me six weeks to work up the nerve to get on skates. And even then it wasn't at a practice, but in an empty rink where I could shuffle and fall without anyone seeing. I wish now that I had gone to that first official practice, that I had let my desire make me brave sooner rather than later. In roller derby you learn how to stay in derby stance so you have less chance of falling, and you learn how to fall (forward) so you won't hurt yourself. By going it alone and trying to protect myself from the emotional discomfort of being awkward in front of strangers, I fell backwards -- and badly.

With a seriously bruised tailbone and an inflamed sense of fear, I waited another week and a half to get back on the proverbial eight-wheeled horse -- still not at an official practice, but at a Saturday night open skate that some of the derby girls frequent. I emailed Bombino ahead of time to say I'd be there, put on my most badass tee-shirt underneath my clothes, and made myself go. 

That night I made it around the rink 10 times without falling. Not 10 consecutive times, but 10 times nonetheless. I spent the first hour skating from wall to wall in the miniature kiddie rink in-between sitting down to rest my legs. When Bombino saw me standing on the edge of the main rink, watching people zip around with ease while I calculated my chances of successfully joining in, she skated over and talked me out onto the floor. We skated four slow laps before my legs burned with the effort and sent me back to my seat.

The fine people of Westmoreland Roller Derby gave me many things that night, whether they knew it or not. Bombino offered me much needed encouragement. Massiecre let me wear her knee pads so I could try a few laps without so much fear of falling. Murder Monroe, S.O.S., Franks Red Hot, and The Iguana all chatted with me, which is a true gift when you're the new girl. Sue Zee Haymaker offered to give me an old pair of skates that she'd bought at a flea market. I stayed until the rink closed at midnight and then joined everyone at Eat'n Park for a late night snack. 

After that, I drove the two of us home, me and my shadow self. I needed some rest; my first practice was coming up in two days.

This New Way of Being (Roller Derby Makes Me Brave #3)

This is Part 3 of "Roller Derby Makes Me Brave," an ongoing series in which I chronicle my journey to becoming a derby girl. To make sense of this post, you may want to read the whole series or the individual posts.

Thirty-six years and I've barely inhabited my body, but a bruised tailbone pulls one's attention down into the seat of a self. My body. My tailbone. Nerves and pain at the base of my spine, a flinch and quick "eesh" of air sucked in through teeth every time I sat or stood or shifted.

I fell because I was roller skating. Lured onto wheels by the siren song of Roller Derby. I fell because I was trying to be brave. I fell because I was tired of being so careful in my everyday living.

I've never played an organized sport, never been one to willingly break a sweat, and I've never liked the saying, "No pain no gain."

Thirty-six years, and what do I know of this body?

I don't engage in physically high-risk activities. At most, my lifetime accumulation of injuries have been minor: Skinned knees, paper cuts, bruises (sometimes in strange places) that I can't recall causing. A slip and fall on ice. The worst of anything has been my ankles, each one severely sprained multiple times, starting with a fall in eighth grade gym class. A torn ligament in college, a stupid (sober) fall running around campus before graduation. Never broken a bone, but friends would (do) call me clumsy, accident prone.

It's not a label I think much about. It just is. Until it's something else.

Advil and ice helped the pain, but there wasn't anything I could take to fight off the confusion and fear that burbled up with each dull ache and stab.

I wrestled with the tension that vibrates between between pride and shame. So proud of myself for getting on skates, for falling and getting back up. So proud! And so ashamed for taking a risk and getting hurt. I hid my guilt behind a thin veneer of bravado and practical pronouncements: "It's not so bad. There's not much you can do for a bruised tailbone except rest it." That week was uncomfortable, not just for my backside, but for my inner compass. I was learning to look at the world through a new lens, the lens of I took a risk and got hurt, but that doesn't mean I'm stupid or bad or irresponsible.

This was a new way of being in the world. If you played sports as a child, you may not understand this. If you are accustomed to taking physical risks, you may not comprehend. But if all your life you've been bundled up in...

Play it safe
Be careful
Take it easy

...then you may understand this. You may comprehend the profound nature of this shift.

All my life I've been afraid of getting hurt.
All my life this tension between desire and fear.

No sex before marriage. No sky diving. No driving too fast or without a seat belt. No drugs. No excessive drinking. No. No. No.

I've bubble wrapped myself in worry.

The day I stepped outside of that soft bunting, the bubble burst. An epiphany of the obvious: Sometimes people do things for fun that can hurt them. And this is not wrong. This is an acceptable way of being in the world. 

At age 36 I was learning what most 10-year-olds know. Kids who play sports learn these lessons about their bodies, their limits, their capabilities at a young age. They learn how to get hurt and how to heal. How to get hurt again and still not fear. Here I was, approaching (or perhaps already at) middle age, navigating, for the first time, this new way of being in the world. This new way of being in my body. This new way of being me. This new way of being. This new way. This.

20 Years, 2 Skates, 1 Fall (Roller Derby Makes Me Brave #2)

This is Part 2 of "Roller Derby Makes Me Brave," an ongoing series in which I chronicle my journey to becoming a derby girl. (You can read the whole series or the individual posts.)

You arrive at Hot Shots Sports Arena on a warm Wednesday afternoon in March, half an hour before the open skate ends. The roller derby team you're thinking about joining practics here on Sundays, but you want to make your maiden voyage alone. You haven't been on a pair of roller skates since you were 16 -- and that was 20 years ago. Thirty minutes is plenty of time for this second first time; you're not sure your legs will hold up much longer than that.

You wiggle your feet into the teal and orange rental skates, pleased with the serendipity; the skates match your teal and brown striped socks. You're sitting on a bench against the wall, several yards away from the entrance to the rink, which is more accurately called a court, since it's enclosed in plexiglass and usually used for roller hockey. Out here on the bench, the floor beneath your feet is polished concrete, hard and smooth. You lace up. A little pixie of a girl, probably about seven years old, whizzes past on inline skates. You envy her.

You wish there were a bench closer to the court entrance. You tilt onto your toe stops, hold on to the bench, twist and rise to a squatted position. Now you're standing on the polished concrete floor, and oh dear goodness, it's like ice. You keep all eight wheels on the floor and use the wall to propel yourself. You glide ever so slowly toward the door.

There are two courts in Hot Shots. Some kids are playing on the one to your left, but yours is empty. Here's the plan:

Try to stay on your feet.
Back and forth along a 20-foot section of wall.
Nothing fancy, nothing fast. (Not that you could do either if you tried.)

You notice a few women, mothers of the kids playing on the other court, glancing back at you. You wonder if they envy or pity you. You want to shout to them in a Rock-n-Roll voice: "Roller Derby, Baby!" (You don't.)

Face the wall, hold onto the ledge. Wiggle your toes. Look around. Shuffle your feet back and forth just a little bit. Now, turn so the wall is to your side. Push off with your hands, coast, stop with your hands on the ledge.

Do this for five minutes, maybe ten. Your legs will start to ache almost immediately. Your feet may start to cramp. You'll realize you have the beginnings of an ingrown toenail on the big toe of your right foot.

Next, try a little bit of actual skating. Lift a foot and use it to push off. (You can stay close to the wall.) Lift the other foot and push forward again.

Around the 15-minute mark a muscle memory courses through your body and you merge with the 11-year-old version of yourself who used to do this on weekends. Your mind is shocked to realize that your legs and hips might have an intelligence all their own. Give yourself over to it. Listen for the rhythm. You hear Tina Turner singing "What's Love Got to Do With It?" even though there is no music playing in Hot Shots. Tina's voice is low and sultry, almost inaudible, but it's there.

Swing your hips to Tina.

Step, glide, step.

Step, glide, stop.

Turn. Do it again.

You've been on the skates for 20 minutes when you start to think about what that first fall will be like. You know it's inevitable; everyone falls at some point. You feel proud of your Zen-like acceptance of this fact, and just as you wonder if it would be better to get it out of the way so you don't have to --- BAM!!

Both legs go out in front of you, it's a long way down -- the fall is fast and slow at the same time, the way car accidents are -- to a straight and heavy landing on your ass.

Your 36-year-old ass, which is much heavier and much further away from the ground than your 11-year-old ass ever was.

Your spine absorbs the shock and you feel the impact travel all the way up into your neck, through the base of your head, and then shoot out the top of it like an orange firework of pain and triumph.

"Well, at least that's out of the way," you think.

You sit there for a minute or two, rolling your neck from side to side, marveling that you didn't break your wrist trying to catch yourself. For the first time in your life, you are acutely aware of your tail bone.

You get up onto your knees, and your head pops up above the court's ledge like you're a prairie dog. The women look back at you again. You realize you're going to have to stand-up while wearing these skates. You need to get back on this horse, of course. Tina Turner didn't let anyone keep her down, did she? You knee-walk over to the wall, rest a minute more, and then pull yourself back up onto your toe stops. All eight wheel on the court.

Five more minutes, back and forth along the wall, still alone in the court. The big clock in the center of the sports hall hits 3:00 p.m. Open skate is closed.

Gently lower yourself toward the floor, sit down, and take the skates off in here. Walk back to your street shoes, which wait for you on the polished concrete underneath the bench. When your tail bone makes contact with the bench you wince just a little.

You're proud of yourself. Really, really proud. You think Tina would be, too.

me (bruised, sweaty, and proud) after my first skate in 20 years