My Response to the Article On That Skating Rink That Burned Down

Jeepers, that old skating rink burned down, huh? You mean the one with all those pretty girls who never paid any attention to me because I couldn’t skate, and the only time they actually paid attention to me was when they were all laughing at me because I would always go out there, fall and hurt myself, and later come back in a cast, and then break some more bones to the point where I now have to spend the rest of my life in this wheel chair? That skating rink? Oh my goodness! I wonder how it burned down. They say that it seemed to have been done deliberately. Or was it an act of God?

Thinking of this place really brings back a lot of memories for me, and none of them happy ones. I think the word “frustrating” fits it better. That’s right. Frustrating. For me, going to this skating rink as a kid was like going to church. My parents would drag me down there every day, and I would fall and injure myself, and everyone would laugh at me. My mom wanted me to be the next Brian Boytonno. My dad, on the other hand, wasn’t necessarily hoping to turn me into Brian Boytonno, unlike my mother. He thought that going to this skating rink would make me tough. That it would build character and turn me into a man. But that just didn’t seem to add up, because when I think of guys skating, “tough” just isn’t the first word that comes to mind. In fact, when I think of Brian Boytonno, the name “Boytonno” doesn’t seem to fit. He needs to get rid of that “boy” part of his name and put “girl” there. In fact, looking back on it now, I think that just maybe, my mom might have wanted me to be gay. For after she would send me out onto the cold, hard ice to injure myself and later have to be taken to the hospital, the pretty girls there would laugh at and mock me, and I took it as a sign that my mom thought that if the girls were mean enough to me, then maybe I would end up like Brian Boytonno by ending up on a cooking show, making “yummy” tasting things that are “scrumptious” and “lovely” and “decedent” and “sinful” and, oh what else, “naughty.”

Yep, that was how I spent my youth there. It wasn’t as bad in the summer time, even though I probably got the same amount of injuries and humiliation, because I was at least able to escape the heat. But why did they have to take me there in the wintertime, when there is already snow outside? Couldn’t they at least give me some new scenery? Besides, in the wintertime, there aren’t any pretty girls there. Sure, they were cruel. Sure, they always did their best to humiliate me, but hey, they were good looking. There was just a big group of mean guys who would stuff me into trash cans on my way home. And they were much better at skating than I was. And to make matters worse, they didn’t even look like Brian Boytonno. They looked more like Marlin Brando. And they had motorcycles. And the girls who laughed at me were usually riding those motorcycles on the back. And they never crashed those motorcycles, because unlike me, they were coordinated. And they could stand on the ice, and not fall down and break their bones. They could stand still on the ice and not move a mussel. And they could look cool. They were as cool and cooler than Marlin Brando. My dad would say, “You’re a screw up! Why can’t you be as cool as THOSE guys on ice? These skating lessons aren’t cheap, you know!” And my mom thought they were hot on ice.

So again, I wonder how that place burned down. I just wonder how the heck that place burned down. On an unrelated note, I wonder if all wheel chairs have the same tire track markings. I sure hope so.