Skateaway

There was a tiny dance floor there

with flashing pink and blue lights

and a disco ball; just you and maybe

three of your friends could fit on it

and you weren’t allowed to wear your

skates. Once we were on it and “Sister

Christian” or “Another One Bites the

Dust” began with cheers, you couldn’t

do anything but pace and giggle. This

was before ugliness set in; you could

still qualify as cute, and in a business-y

high-collared blouse and miniature

Jordaches you were even allowed to

do little-girl flirting with the cuter boys.

The first pair of skates came from

The Sportsman, which disappeared with

the eighties, taking its tackle and sweaty-

smelling footballs with it. The pure white

ones were purchased at a closing sale

at Woolworth’s, and it was on these skates

that you learned what it was like to be

brushed aside, the smells of moldy carpet

and popcorn and stale nachos and the

blinking Centipede the same, but you

were different and there was no one there

to tell you how to be like everybody else.