Rollerball

It is to the credit of the public school system and television that I was exposed to lifestyles different from the one I knew at home. Lifestyles where wearing shoes was commonplace, women wore make-up without the fear of eternal retribution, and “tarred” was something that was done to roads; not the way one felt after a long day. There was another very unexpected source of my exposure to yet another reality.

By the time I was twelve or thirteen, the family had abandoned the distant country church we had attended since my birth as a result of a scandal involving my very own Sunday school teacher, Sister Opal, and the pastor. We now attended a considerably more modern “Church of God” within the city limits. While the doctrine of the church was essentially the same, the dogma collar had been loosened several notches. So modern, and by my family’s standard, risqué, was this church, that the youth group I attended organized a roller skating party at the local skating rink, Ohio Skate.

I had never been roller skating. My parental leash had previously only reached as far as the backyard. Further incentive: there would be regular, secular music that wasn’t allowed at home. Those decadent Top 40 songs I played “Mission Impossible” to secretly listen to every Sunday with Casey Kasem would be played…uninterrupted and LOUD. And there would be no risk of catching a limber switch about my legs for getting caught listening to this “devil’s music,” because, further incentive here: mom and dad would NOT be there. I had to go and I had the church on my side. Now, for all the reasons that I knew I had to go, my father knew I would not. This would be one of our biggest struggles and one of my brightest victories. With the church’s backing and my mom’s diligent intervention, I was going roller skating.

The night of the party came. My father grunted as I left for the skating rink, trying hard not to break into a full run out of the door. Entering the crowded rink, I was saucer-eyed at all the people, the blaring beat of the music. What was this playing? It was in the Top 10 Sunday. “Heart of Glass,” that’s it. My mind raced with the beat-driven flashing of the floor lights. I was captivated by all of this and by the…freedom. I could breathe here. I immediately began my campaign to return here as often as I could. Every Tuesday and Saturday night between seven and nine-thirty admission was only $3.50 and free skate rental. I would do this. I had to be here. With my Mom’s persistent efforts on my behalf and my commitment to use my earnings from helping to clean the church to pay for my outings, I won! I wasn’t just going back. I was going twice a week, every week. In the bad cinema of my mind, I saw myself in “Rollerball,” ripping off my helmet to a cheering crowd as I cut off my father and passed into the freedom lane.

For these two-and-a-half hours, from seven to nine-thirty, twice a week, I left my little “Butcher Holler” world and disappeared into another galaxy called “Ohio Skate.” I had never skated. I had never danced. Now, I was to do both. Now, keep in mind the only rhythm I had known thus far provided embarrassment and an eventual reprimand from mom. I mean what rhythm could be mined from “Flatt & Scruggs”?! “Flatt and Scruggs” actually sounds like it could be an urban insult describing white folks that just can’t dance. “Yo, man, check out Flatt and Scruggs!” Fortunately, as I surveyed the rest of the skaters from the floor-side railing, they too seemed to be using my only frame of reference for rhythm to choreograph their skating. I could do this. I inched onto the floor, encouraged by the Sugarhill Gang to “Hip, Hop, the hippet, the hippet, the hip hip, hoppit, you don’t stop rockin…” I wasn’t “rockin,” but I was walking, then sliding, then rolling…without clutching the rail! The Sugarhill Gang rapped on. “To the bang bang boogie to be. Say up jump the boogie to be.” I didn’t really feel like my “boogie” was “jumping” yet, though I’m not sure I would have known it, had my boogie jumped. I moved along the wall, risking letting go, and finally moving beyond an arm’s length away. Now…I would move into the circular flow of these cool people shaking their hips and their feathered hair or I would surely die under their skates. The headline would read, “Hip Hop Kills Hick on Skates.” The skaters sang along with the rap, “Say hotel, motel, whatcha gonna do today?” In my mind I answered with an iron willed determination, "I’m going to skate around this rink and I’m going to find rhythm. I’m pleased to report that I did become adept at making it around the rink; rhythm, however, eluded me as surely as the concept of skating backwards.

Okay, so the skating rink may have been a routine these kids took for granted. Not me. This was like fucking Vegas to me. Don’t misunderstand me, I didn’t suddenly blossom into a skating rink rico suave. I still didn’t have feathered hair or those nubby brown-suede hiking boots with red laces that were mandatory for “cool.” I was a wallflower. But, a wallflower at the skating rink was euphoric compared to cocooning in the separate world of my room.

During “ALL SKATES” I skated the circumference of the rink doing my best to mimic anyone who looked remotely cool, and do my very best to not get caught admiring the floor guard, Paul. I remembered Paul. Paul was the son of my favorite family friend from church so long ago, Mrs. Williams. I remembered Paul, but not like this. If I was fourteen at this time, Paul must have been nineteen. Something dramatic had happened to the ten-year-old I remembered. Paul was maybe 6’2’’; lean, yet muscular. While this may seem ripe for the potential of sexual attraction, if it was, I was certainly unaware of it. The topic of sex at that point remained an undisclosed mystery to me and that was just the standard “copulate-to-procreate and live-to-regret-it-missionary-style-monogamous sex” the church approved of. I had no idea what this was. I only knew I really enjoyed looking at Paul. His dark skin, deep eyes, and cool demeanor aroused a longing for an intimacy with him I would not have known what to do with. And when the floor was cleared for a couple’s skate and the lights went down, my imagination took over: In my mind, Paul silently dedicated all of my favorite couple skate songs to me and our love. I knew that he longed as deeply as I did to blow off all this pretense and expectation and enjoy the intimacy of the couple’s skate with each other. We would throw caution to the wind, as well as all the racism and homophobia Findlay, Ohio had to offer in 1979 and declare our love openly. As the last notes of the song, “Still” by the Commodores faded and we embraced before exiting the floor, our quick, but unmistakably passionate kiss would send a seismic ripple from the skating rink throughout the community. As we ran into the night with the townspeople bearing down on us carrying torches, hurling skates and hateful epithets at us, we knew this would only serve to make our love bond stronger…Then the flashing, colored lights would come back up in time for me to see some girl circle Paul and snatch a kiss that was not hers to take, as Chic sang, “These are the good times!” I could not have disagreed more.

I had to return to the ‘Hee Haw’ set of home, my mother’s illnesses, the paternal conflict, and the really bad drapes. But, I had tasted freedom and safety, connection, something like attraction, and a slight, but very real sense of independence. I would be back to savor each song lyric and strobe lit stolen glance. I would be back, but I would never be the same. Over the skating rink speakers The Little River Band sang, “It’s time for a cool change”…I didn’t only agree, I knew one had already happened.