On Sunday I wandered down to Mayme Moore Park to attend the first event for the Fat Babes Club of Columbus event, Fat Wheels. It was inspired by the Chubrollz events in CA which provides a safe space for fat skaters, skateboarders, etc. I threw on a white tank top from Blood and Thunder, my black Shells Bells bellbottoms from Moxi and headed out to skate and make some new skate friends.
These ladies put on such amazing, open, welcoming events. I got to chat with a lot of skaters of various levels of experience. And I even got to get an amazing girl, who’s grandmother was a derby skater, onto skates for her first time. Hell Yes! I got no photos at the event because I was having such a great time and socializing.
Elizabeth, Hannah, Jae and Krystal who started the Fat Babes Club are amazing and I can’t wait to see what other events they have in store for us this year, including more Fat Wheels meet ups. The video below is from their instagram and you can see how fun it was.
I am still madly in love with roller skating, which is not altogether shocking since I have loved it since I was a child. I skated both days this weekend and enjoyed every moment of it.
Yesterday I met my friends Amy and Christina at The Warehouse, which is a parking garage set up for skateboarding and roller skaters by a church. The floor is so ridiculously smooth and it was easy to skate on and to practice tricks and such. I met several more amazing skaters: Sparky, Alex and Faego.
Amazing sign on the wall at The Warehouse
Today I met Amy, Hannah and Jake at Como Elementary for a morning skate. Como has incredibly smooth asphalt as well, and I made a short video of me skating a circle in the court.
I have a color scheme.
I recently put in an order for a new pair of skates, because mine are well over 16 years old. Skates are hard to come by right now, and mine are probably not going to be ready until early next year. I am excited for them though. I ordered Moxi Panthers, and they are a leopard print dream!
Ack! So cute!
I am having so much fun falling back in love with skates and skating. I am going to work on rehabbing my vintage skate case over the winter and get it ready to house my new skates.
One of the members of my newly created skate group Skate Expectations (Jake) held a public skate party on Saturday in Grandview. My little sister, Traci, came to pick me up and we headed over to skate. We kind of inadvertently matched a little which was funny. Lots of pinks, purples and turquoise for us!
Traci and I in our skate finery at the party Saturday night.
We got to meet members of The Crunch Ramp Supremes who are absolutely bad ass skaters from the area. I am in absolute awe of them, and I am going to be working harder at learning tricks and feeling stronger on my wheels. I joined their group on Meet Up, so I am hoping I can join them occasionally when they go out to skate.
Members of the Crunch Ramps and the DJ Set up.
It was Traci’s first time out on her new skates and she took off like she had been skating forever. She fell once, and unfortunately it was on camera, but…still overall a great time.
Traci skating, random skaters
We skated on and off for about 2 hours before we decided we should call it a night. Jake says he is definitely going to do it again and he asked if I would help with planning which of course I agreed to do. I am super excited to be involved and for the outlet to skate. I had forgotten/ written off how much I love to skate, but getting back out there it is all coming back.
I believe I have spoken on the blog before about my love of Roller Skating. I have been roller skating since I was probably 5, but possibly even younger than that. I grew up having old skates that my cousins and I could hold skate parties with in my grandparents garage and driveway. I was also a frequent attendee of our local skating rink in Newark, Roll-a-Way spending hours there on my quad skates happy as a clam.
I bought a new pair of quad skates in 2004 or so when I learned about Ohio Roller Derby, then the Ohio Roller Girls, and I wanted to do derby so badly. I bought my skates and I began going out to try to get my skate skills back. I would train with them several times in anticipation of trying out, but it never worked out that I could play. And after a fall, not skating related just klutzy, I tore my ACL and because of the nature of derby I knew that continuing to train would eventually lead to surgery, so I stopped training and became an athletic supporter instead (See Eight Wheels of Badass Joy, Talk Derby to Me: First Bout of 2019, and Skatemare Before Christmas)
Then in 2020 the pandemic happened and I started to see people buying skates and skating on Instagram (Nicole Byer being a huge Inspiration as was Rolla Skate Club). I decide I would like to get back on skates, so I go to the internet. I already have skates, a couple of pairs in fact, but I needed new pads (knee, elbow and wrist), a new helmet, a skate strap and I decided I wanted a pair of toe covers since mine were pretty scuffed.
I found my pads as a set on Moxi. They were roughly $75 for the full set of Knee, Elbow and Wrist pads. And on the same site I found a turquoise and pink leopard print helmet and I just had to have it, so I put in an order. I got a skate strap from PeaceGrenade on Etsy in Magenta Glitter. I got an amazing sticker that says Skate Witch from Simply Savage Design which lives on my helmet and I just ordered another couple to add to new things. I bought my toe caps from Rollerstuff they are super shiny leather and I LOVE them. All together the whole set looks like this:
So…now I had skates, and gear, and no one to skate with. I had a thought and then I went to social media and I said:
So…I added this on Instagram and Facebook just to see if anyone would respond or be interested, and the answer was a resounding yes. I had many friends respond that they were in, that they were looking for a reason to buy skates, and so on. I created a Facebook Group called Skate Expectations and we have our first meet up this Friday after work. I am so excited that this is becoming a thing, and also I am somewhat surprised, but so excited. I am hoping that I can branch this out into more interesting things. I have ideas!!
I can remember the first time I put on a pair of roller skates. I was 5. We had a field trip to roll-a-way skating rink for my Daisy girl scout troop. My mother strapped me into the skates and I was off. My mother was terrified because I had my tongue sticking out the whole time and she was sure I was going to fall and bite my tongue in half. That never happened (thank god) but inside me a love sparked that I carry to this day.
As a preteen I would slip my Paula Abdul tape into the boombox and skate in circles in my garage for hours. Round and round to Cold Hearted Snake and Hush just me and my favorite skates. In the late nineties I would flirt with inline skates, but I always came back to my favorite quad skates. In my teens I would stop skating for a bit, switching with my friends to skateboarding which was not my forte.
In my twenties I was at the Columbus International Body Arts Expo when I saw a flyer on a table for a newly forming Roller Derby team in Columbus. I was immediately interested, but was trepidatious so I just didn’t pull the trigger. One of my coworkers joined, and I was there at the very first exhibition bout. I was mesmerized by these ladies, who were skating rock stars.
With names like Scarlette Fury, Ruby Doom, and Holly Hotwheels these badass women were the hardcore skaters that I always wanted to be. They were fast, and hard hitting. They were semi-violent tank girls on quad skates. All I wanted was to be one of them, be friends with them, and to support them in any way possible.
Since then I have gone to at least one bout every year. I trained with them for a couple of wannabe sessions a few years ago, until a freak non-skating knee injury led to a torn ACL. I have volunteered by working the door, and anywhere else they need me. And next season my friend Susan and I are going to be Roller Derby cheerleaders for Ohio Roller Derby.
It has been a while, but I am also beginning to want to get back on my skates. I have begun checking out paths that are smooth enough for skating, and safe enough. I need to get my skates out to give them some TLC. I think I am going to paint them, and maybe glitter them up a bit. It’s time to skate again.
Betsy Snow White Bibliophile 