Blades Of Steel

The greatest joy a father can experience is sharing an interest with his son. Yesterday, I took Kyle to my “happy place” – the ice rink – for the first time. He has been dying to get on the ice and skate, and it was our first opportunity to lace ‘em up. I rented a pair of skates for him – hockey skates to boot, not those lame figure skates – but since it was his first time, I also grabbed a little help in the form of a metal walker. A lot of the young kids use them to prop themselves up while they skate around.

Kyle must have thought that was lame, since he never used it.

Surprisingly, he picked it up fairly quickly. I grabbed his hand, and we made performed countless laps around the rink. He never held on to the boards, and only fell down a few times. Two non-stop hours later, the public skating session ended, and he stopped smiling for the first time all day. We stopped by the snack bar for soft pretzels and Gatorade, while he bombarded me with questions like, “When can we go again?” “When can I join a hockey team?” and “How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll Pop?”

It was a good day.