O/T Roller Skates

[phild]

Who remembers attaching these things to your shoes. Forget Skateboards, These were the real thing. I had many a grazed knee with these on.

[Albionic68]

I had a second hand pair of those for my birthday when I was a kid. I think I was seven or eight. Christ, my parents must have secretly hated me. I also tried to roller skate on a pair at Butlins Minehead when I was ten...... an equally disastrous outcome. Funny though. No wonder my knees are completely fkd.

[kettering_baggie]

I had a pair of metal roller skates when I was a kid but they didn’t have the lace up stuff on them; each skate had two metal clamps that you tightened or loosened with a key. They were not particularly secure and your shoes would sometimes escape the clamps with a predictable result!

[mickd1961]

I had the balance and poise of George Riley when I tried roller skates.

Although I’ve been fitness mad as an adult I was a fat kid, think Doughnut off “Double Deckers” if you need a visual, I have a photo from when I was about 15 where I look like a mid t e e n s Elvis as he looked close to death!

Anything requiring balance and natural ability was as alien to me as the truth is to Heath Secretary Matt Cockhand!

My late dad however!!

Naturally gifted at any sport he tried whether he liked it or not.

Ambidextrous so could play any bat or racket sport with either hand. When I was 20 and my brother was 16 he played us at table tennis in front of a crowd at our hotel.

Us as a doubles pair and him as by then, a tubby 47 year old.

He slaughtered us and yet my brother was a very decent player and I was okay.

He hated cricket but one day the gas board who he worked for at the time asked him to fill in late for someone.

He batted at 10 and scored 88 not out, at one point it got too easy so he switched to play left handed 😎😆

A two footed centre forward who scored huge numbers in local football in Harrogate, Derek Kevin was his local contemporary and that bit better than my dad.

Huddersfield Town were a top flight side and wanted my dad as a t e e n a g e r but my nan refused as he’d gained a scholarship to Ashville College which I’m sure Prando will have heard of, it’s still one of the top schools in the U.K. and costs a fortune in fees, dad was one of the first six boys to gain a free place there.

They didn’t play football so he took up rugby and played first team and county.

An so to the roller skating.

He retired at 56 due to shingles in his middle ear which is very rare and caused him balance issues.

So when my then 12 year old daughter had a roller skating party at the Crystal Centre in Stourbridge my mum was appalled when my 63 year old dad strapped on a pair of skates😲⚰️

He was unbelievable.

First time on skates in 45 years and he flew around faster than any of the kids and they all loved seeing him do it,they thought he was so cool which in truth, he really was.

Six years later he was dead because he’d smoked 40 a day for most of his adult life.

This has actually prompted a lost memory for me as I know we have a video of him skating that night that I haven’t watched in over 20 years and I must now hunt it out.

The truth is that I’ve hidden from those videos for over 17 years because I just know that I’ll be inconsolable when I hear his voice and see him moving again.

I can look at pictures of him and smile but seeing him in living form feels almost unbearable even now 17 years after his death.

Apologies for rambling on when the main topic was roller skating but this just bright back to me what a truly awesome bloke and dad he was.