obelisk 2022
buried the memory , filed it away in the deepest corner of my mind . I only really know what happened from what my parents have told me . On that promising evening , the crisp air mingling with the scent of steaming hot chocolate , lively music blaring , my parents and I sat on a bench to put on rental skates . With smiles on their faces , my parents each took one of my hands , flanking me as the three of us stepped out onto the ice . Within one minute , all three of us were on our bottoms with a loud thud . In the most alarming way , multiple people skidded to a stop around our heads , ice spraying in the air . “ Are you okay ?!” they shouted . Grimacing with embarrassment , we got up again and glided a few feet before the three of us were again splayed out on the ice as a single unit . “ I thought you knew how to skate !” my mom hissed at my dad , even as he asked the same of my mom . “ I grew up in Hawaii ,” she muttered and groaned .
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Dad finally made a move for the door handle and popped the trunk open . I grabbed my skates and , as I lifted them , I noticed that each skate was as heavy as a dumbell . “ I really want this ,” I reminded myself . As I headed toward the rink door , my thoughts were of my hero , Henrik Lundqvist , the New York Rangers goalie , knowing that he too must have had a first time experience when he was a kid . He certainly was not born with skates , although in his case , he probably had tiny skates slapped onto his pudgy little feet the moment he could stand . “ This is it , I ’ m going to do this ,” I thought as I walked through that door , scarred by every hockey stick that had ever banged into it and dented by the steel blades of skates carelessly swung from their laces . I knew there was no reason to turn back now , not after all the begging that had gotten me to this point . Someday my stick would hit that door and leave my mark as a player .
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