Lloyd Center Ice Rink

I’ll have to take a picture next time!

We were in Portland for the long weekend looking for things to do with the kids when our friend, who has a niece the same age as our oldest, suggested ice skating at Lloyd Center. We acquiesced hesitantly, feeling a little vulnerable after a couple of beers.

The next morning we awoke, had some breakfast, went for a swim in the hotel pool, dressed, and went for lunch and a stroll along NW 23rd. Then it was time to rendezvous at the ice rink. About the time we pulled into the parking garage I started getting a queasy feeling in my stomach. I knew my body was more aware of the coming situation than my conscience mind was. I started to think that I had been deluding myself into believing this would be no big deal. I conferred with Susan and she acknowledged the same feelings of WTF? Each of us had only been ice skating once before in our lives, 20+ years ago. Neither of our kids, ages 6 and 4, had ever skated or even seen an ice rink in person. The only skating they had ever seen was Olympic skating on TV, and one can only imagine what they expected.

Lloyd Center is a sprawling shopping mall across the river from Downtown and the ice rink is in the center of the mall, a major aspect of this adventure that I had neglected to foresee. It meant that potentially thousands of people would witness my every stumble, slip, and butt-bruising fall, while proud mothers, fathers, and grandparents, watching from beyond the rink walls with more sense than to move about ice on two very narrow steel blades, would capture it all on their video cameras. When this realization came to me in full, I balked. I must have asked both kids 10 times, “are you sure you want to do this?” hoping against hope that they were as fearful as I after seeing the huge crowd. They are often deterred by the most basic things which keeps them in a persistent state of wishy-washyness, but not this time. They were both determined. And so with their confidence my confidence rose a notch and we got in line for tickets and skates.

It was a madhouse getting the skates, then putting them on, then getting to the rink. Some sadistic twit must have thought it brilliant fun to put the skate rental downstairs from the rink so as to humble everyone as they attempt to climb upstairs in the most foreign footwear imaginable. Somehow my daughters were completely unphased, as if they had spent their entire lives walking like penguins on blades the width of a pencil. Then there was the slow shuffle to the rink entrance, where I hovered for a moment in solemn prayer (the agnostic’s version, where I shout obscenities in my mind at no one in particular), followed by the “what the hell” first step onto the ice. But I was was completely unprepared for what happened next.

I didn’t fall. I held my four-year-old’s hands, and occasionally gripped the wall, but as for my balance, I seemed to find it quite quickly and naturally. Concentrating on my kid’s experience kept me from freaking about what I was doing. It was amazing. It was fun. We spent two hours going around and around. The kids fell a few times, but neither I nor Susan fell. Incredible. We’re planning to go ice skating again.

You should try it, too.