Last week on NBC Sports-Out of Bounds, I had the chance to recap another of my failures, my sad, short-lived attempt at learning how to figure skate."I studied theatre in college and took enough of the required classes -- things like "Stage Makeup", "Advanced Stage Makeup" and "We Get It, You Can Paint Your Face to Look Like a Bluebird" -- to wrap up my major halfway through my senior year. For my final semester, I loaded my schedule with a number of brain-busters that involved eyeliner and emoting but was still one credit short of the minimum requirement. I flipped to the Physical Education section of the course catalog, which was like a cruise ship's activity guide, offering everything from Bowling to Tennis to -- yes! -- Figure Skating.
Figure Skating sounded like the perfect introduction to the starched white-collar life I hoped would be waiting for me on the other side of graduation, one that involved cloth napkins and roasted pheasant and other things I probably should've considered before majoring in Theater. So I signed up for the class, a twice-a-week commitment to tiered skirts and twisted ankles.
We were supposed to meet the instructors at our local ice rink and I should've known it was a bad sign when I couldn't even make it inside before sprawling face-down on the partially-frozen sidewalk. I was already limping when I took my first tentative steps onto the ice, but still knew I was going to be a natural. I had grace. I had balance. And I had ice chips lodged in my personal areas before I'd even made it halfway around the rink."
You can read the whole story here. How many of you can say that your senior year involved feverishly clutching an elderly woman's arm and trying not to cry? You know what, don't answer that.
