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Thinking back about it, roller skating has more memories of youthful
romance and a sense of intimacy attached to it than dancing does,
though presumably that's out of the norm. (Nothing unusual there,
though!)
This impression probably can be attributed to the fact that I thought
I was "in love" for most of the time I was roller skating regularly,
and the dates I had with my junior varsity sweetheart were mostly
at Cicero's roller rink. I always took the bus provided for the skating
parties; she was more often dropped off and picked up at Cicero's
by her parents who, no doubt, had heard scandalous reports about adolescent
misbehavior in the skate busses (some of which were true).
A two-hour Saturday evening skate program included approximately
equal portions of "all-skates" and "couple's-only skates" mixed in
with the hokey pokey, Mexican hat dance, and one or two other novelties
(as described in Bonnie Farabaugh's post earlier), a trio, and a ladies'
choice (these days, that could just be counted as another "couple's
skate," but at that time two girls skating together—which was
done—were not considered a couple). Two boys would never do a
"skate" together, but there was more touching on the roller rink between
members of the same gender than in normal life. I also witnessed at
least one all-out fist-slinging and rolling-on-the-floor fight on
the rink.
The best "skates" were those accompanied by much-liked popular songs
(as opposed to those accompanied by not-so-well-liked records or organ
music). I remember, most of all, "Tammy," by Debbie Reynolds, which
was "our" song. And I still recall "In the Middle of an Island," which
was the occasion of the most embarrassing question I'd ever been asked
till then: "would you like to be stranded on a deserted island with
a girl?" I also remember standards by Paul Anka ("Diana"), Johnny
Mathis ("The Twelfth of Never"), Pat Boone ("Love Letters on the Sand"),
Jim Reeves ("Four Walls"), and "No Not Much" by the Four Lads, whose
name I remember only via Google.
What skating moments have shaken loose in your memory?
For tomorrow, I plan to include a down-sized copy of the postcard-photo
of Cicero's sent by William Martin.
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Webmaster
Jon Kennedy
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Sent
by Mike Harrison
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Obstacles are what you see when you lose sight of your goal.
Pain & suffering are inevitable...misery is optional!
People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did,
but people will never forget how you made them feel.
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Sent
by Mike Harrison
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The romance
of roller skating
