The Christmas Skates

All I wanted for Christmas back in 1962 was a pair of white figure skates. I did get them the next year. I loved trying to skate in town at the rink..I never was very good at it. I spent lots of my skating time on the ground, up close and personal with the ice. I loved watching all the town kids skate on Saturdays ..especially the ones that could skate backwards.  I had a hard time going forward upright.. backwards was just a figment of my fruitful imagination. Some of those kids sure could skate.  I did have a beau one winter who could skate backwards..couples would dance and skate holding each other in their arms.. I just kinda hung onto him for dear life and went along for the ride.  The kids in town were really lucky they could skate everyday, and they had a warming house!

The only ice skating that took place on the farm was in the spring in a corner of one of the fields where the spring runoff would collect and freeze for just a few days..but you had to watch out for the weeds that stuck up..they would send you flying. We would haul a block of wood out to the edge of the field so we would have some place to sit down and put on our skates.

My beautiful white skates were a size seven and a half..the last time I can remember wearing them was in the winter of 1972..Far Guy and I would skate down on the narrows in the moonlight. We would put Trica to bed, and head down the hill to shovel a spot to skate. Those skates served me well... I had them much longer than that old pink radio. Not that the radio was a bad gift..it wasn't. I would unplug my parents radio all the time and take it to my room..so I suppose it made perfect sense to them. I don't ever remember wanting anything for Christmas as desperately as those skates.. I just had to wait patiently for them until the next year:)