I headed back to the ice rink today to do some ice skating. Last time I went (I posted about it), there were six people on the rink skating, including me and my sister-in-law.  I enjoyed it so much I decided I was going to go every week, if I could.  It was great exercise and I enjoyed it.

This time, however, the few college students and I were joined by a group of children from a private school. I would guess there were thirty or so children, all ten years old and younger. They were accompanied by a group of parents who watched, taking pictures and videos, and two adult chaperones (and later on a mom) who actually skated with the children. We were also joined by two amateur skaters practicing their tricks in the middle of the rink.

At first, I was a little dismayed at the number of children, because kids don't understand the rules of rink skating. You go in one direction, in a straight line, turn the corners carefully at the appropriate place and never just stop in the middle of the skating lane. Kids don't care about the unspoken rink rules, so you have to be vigilant of the munchkin that decides to dart in front of you, or who stops cold in front of you to look for their friend, or, even worse, the child who falls and manages to slide right across your path, potentially causing a chain reaction of falling skaters. Yeah, it can be brutal out there.

I treat child skaters like I treat cars when my husband and I are on our bicycles: I give them a wide berth, assume they don't see me and are distracted and that their mission is to take me out. In a nutshell, I skate defensively.

Once I got my skate legs back again after several laps, I could concentrate less on my balance and more on what was going on around me.

Most of the kids started out skating while hanging on to the outer wall of the ice rink. That is the default place for most new skaters. Two or three of them clearly knew how to skate and didn't need to do that, but the majority did. The college students who couldn't skate didn't hang onto the wall. They just parked themselves in the skating lane, shuffled their feet, lurched forward and backward, trying to balance their body over their skates. 

I left the rink to tighten my skate laces after a few laps. One of the mom chaperones was standing there next to where I was sitting, and I commented to her how well the children were doing. She agreed and said, "I could never do that...."  She also complimented my skating, and I admitted that I had grown up in New England, so I had been skating since I was very young. I told her that I loved it and found it to be good exercise. 

I went back out there and continued skating. As I passed skaters, I would make encouraging comments to a few of skaters who were clearly beginners or first-timers. I would say "You are doing really good.." or something to that effect.  At one point, I came across a group of people in the middle of the rink. A little boy had fallen, and a mom was standing there with three other small children trying to help him stand up. They could not get him up on his feet as they were being pulled off balance every time they tried to help him up, so I stopped and helped get him to his feet.  

As the time progressed, I noticed that most of the children had abandoned their death grip on the rink wall and were shuffling and skating without hanging on to the wall. There were only a few who were still very cautiously hugging the wall while they shuffled along on the ice.  There was one little girl, who clearly knew how to skate and was trying all kinds of skating tricks, without success, falling most of the time. She could not have been more than eight years old. She just kept getting back up and trying again.  Another child stared me down as I approached and said "lady" quite loudly. I think she thought I was going to careen right into her. No, I wasn't even close. Did I mention she was standing stock still in the skating path of the skaters? 

The joy of children is that many of them have an innocent willingness to try anything that could be fun. That is why small children can't be left with no supervision. They want to try stuff. Some of what they'd try is safe and fun, and some of it is not.  They are remarkably resilient, and when they fail at something or fall down, they get up and try again if they are not hurt. They just get on with it. 

College students are pretty much teenagers with a little more maturity (although I wonder about some of them here in the US.....)  They are not hanging onto that wall because they are going to do better than the children. It's about pride for them. Sure enough, the college student with the flailing arms and precarious balance almost took me out once. He could barely keep upright but he wasn't having anything to do with that wall. 

What about the mom who said, "I could never do that?"  That is what us adults do. It's a little voice we have that tells us "You can't" for a variety of reasons.  It could be anything from "what if I try it and look stupid" to "I might get hurt." Or, the one that haunts many of us, "What if I try and fail?"  These voices come from one place. The place of fear. 

I often tell myself that I have to live in faith and not fear. It's cliche, I know, but that doesn't mean it isn't a valid sentiment to live by. When you get to be my age, you have a lifetime to look back on and see where fear kept you from doing something that could have changed the course of your life or led you down a completely different path. The frustration is not knowing if that path would have been better than the one you are on. All because of fear. 

Are at a point in your life where fear is taking over and keeping you from pursuing things you have secretly wanted to? If so, it might be time to re-evaluate those decisions and put your fear aside. 

Watching the children and college students approach skating today and seeing all the parents (there must have been about 20 or so) who DIDN'T skate really got me thinking about this.

The children certainly don't live in fear. They are crazy little nut jobs who will try anything.

Teenagers live to give us gray hair because they are willing to let pride be a major factor in their choices.

But us adults? Yeah, some of us live in the "what if...." place of fear.

So, if you don't want to pursue my calorie deficit diet in the new year, as a new year's resolution to get healthier, why don't you try this with respect to your secret passions:

Plunge ahead with the willingness of a child, the pride of a teenager, and courage and maturity of an adult. 

Don't let fear be the driver of your car.

Next month I hope to accompany my daughter and her significant other on a day trip to go skiing. I haven't skied in 36 years. I've wanted to go for a very long time but talked myself out of it because of my weight, fear of falling and breaking something, and the fact that my husband would not do it with me, so what was the point. The point is, I loved it when I was in my 20s, even though I was barely a novice, I love how it feels like flying. The views from a snow-covered mountain are worth the effort and I just plain want to do more fun physical things in spite of my aging body.

Hopefully I won't be writing the skiing post from a hospital bed.....