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dragonlady7I just got an apology from the Canadian Roller Derby Association for the brouhaha over the Hamilton game last July. (Apologies for not linking to the entry directly, but the Internet connection here is spotty at best-- the game was July 7 this year and I know I wrote about it shortly after.)
Apparently the CRDA has noticed Hamilton having a pattern of behavior with respect to inviting American teams to come play them and then just beating them up, and there's another match coming up with Penn-Jersey... Well, I suppose I'll make an attempt to find out what comes of it.
But I do feel better-- I was given sort of nebulous intimations that my solitary Myspace blog about how infuriating and un-roller-derby the experience was had ignited some sort of pan-Canadian flamewar on boards I'm not privy to, and everyone was upset with me. I got a few lone messages of support from random Canadian skaters, which actually worried me more. This person who maintains the CRDA's Myspace page may also be acting on his own in contacting me, but I do feel better in that he has, like, an official logo. I know nothing of the administrative structure of our neighbors up north, I admit-- I know little enough of our structure here.
Anyhow. I do feel less put-upon and victimized. I got no support from my league in all that because they were all so out of their depth as well (I'm not starting drama, I'm saying no one else knew what to do either), but it just made the whole thing very bitter and icky and I had to shove feelings about it away every time I saw something pertaining to it. I was just thinking about it again because I watched all our bout highlight reels over the weekend...
Egh. Brr. Bleh. But I feel better now. Marginally. Nothing has changed, but the fact that other people are still thinking about it too makes me feel less of a freak, anyway.
My skating is improving, everyone says. Funny, I thought it was pretty good by the end of last season, so I didn't realize that my current state is an improvement. I'm still fighting back from a lot of muscle atrophy, and feel very weak. But as with most things, if I come into it believing I can do it, I do it easily. So I think I convinced myself over the summer I had been an excellent skater last season, so now I'm better than I was...
New wheels, with bearings that actually turn, help too. It's still a little pathetic if you consider it closely, but it doesn't really matter how silly it is, the point is that I'm improving again, and that's good. When your whole life is lived around imaginary blocks in your head that you don't really know are there, it's a cause for joy when you realize you've circumvented another one.
Danny (the Knockouts' new coach) seems to have understood a bit of the way I work, too-- I was skating all shitty, leaning out of the corners so I lost control and went wide in the straightaways, and he was attempting to convince me to drop my shoulder into the turns, and I didn't get what he was saying. Then we did a drill where we skated the other direction, and I caught on immediately that I had to lead myself around the corner with my right shoulder. So when we went back to the proper direction, I was easily steering myself into the corners with my left shoulder. I remember learning that last season, and I had thought I was doing it, but obviously, every time I get distracted, I forget about it, and it's worse because I think I'm already doing it so it can't be what's messing me up.
So he said, "I'm just going to make you skate the opposite direction before every bout to remind you how to skate right."
And i thought it over. I only learned to cross over properly during a reverse skate at Depew last year. "That would probably be ideal," I said.
"Well," he said, "it forces you to reconsider everything, and realize what you're doing wrong."
I'm just not very aware of my body at the best of times. And skating is not really the best of times. Particularly not when someone is trying to kick your ass while you're skating. And hundreds of people are watching you. Eck.
I am looking forward immensely to the coming season. I think I've finally got a hope of being in control enough of the basics to actually do something useful on the track, rather than shrieking a lot and getting in the way when I fall down (which, hey, has been useful...). The new girls are an energizing force, and just the fact that they see me as a good influence/ venerable old veteran has changed my own perception of myself. I always saw myself as near the bottom of the group last year, and now I naturally (deservedly or not) see myself as better than all the new girls-- probably because so many of them are so humble and eager when they ask for help, even if they're arguably better skaters than me, but I Was Here Last Year So I Know More (true!). Anyway, as my perception of myself shifts, so my body's willingness to perform tasks I didn't know it could also shifts, is what I'm trying to say.
Eh, I may not be making sense to anyone but myself. But I feel better-- I feel like last year there were many instances when I had the capacity to perform, but did not, because I did not see that it was possible to do anything. I would let the jammer get by because it didn't occur to me that I was capable of hitting her. That kind of thing. I was always good at the demanding tasks that asked me only to compete against myself-- I have always gotten up very quickly from falls, I have always kept up well with the pack, that sort of thing, but I have not multitasked well, and have not done well in competition with other girls. But if I recast the whole thing in my mind, view it differently, there is much I can do easily that I simply did not do last season. Like jamming-- I jammed maybe once in scrimmage last season, and did fine, was fast enough, could keep up, could even be strategic in my use of the lead jam status (I confused the refs by not calling the jam when my opponent hit the pack before me; I explained that I knew she'd get through with 3 points, but I also was pretty confident I had it in me to do at least the same, and meanwhile the clock was running down on our pivot's penalty so next jam we could skate with a full complement). But I didn't really think I could get through the openings, and so I always took the long way through the pack, hitting every blocker and making my own holes when I know there must have been plenty already there if I'd just been confident to assess strategically.)
Anyway, I'm being very boring, I know. But it helps me sort out things in my own head. I wish I could write as eloquently as![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
rm does about fencing...
I'm going to go get to work; there's an unpleasant task awaiting me and I just don't feel like dealing with it, but I really can't procrastinate any more. Bleh.
Apparently the CRDA has noticed Hamilton having a pattern of behavior with respect to inviting American teams to come play them and then just beating them up, and there's another match coming up with Penn-Jersey... Well, I suppose I'll make an attempt to find out what comes of it.
But I do feel better-- I was given sort of nebulous intimations that my solitary Myspace blog about how infuriating and un-roller-derby the experience was had ignited some sort of pan-Canadian flamewar on boards I'm not privy to, and everyone was upset with me. I got a few lone messages of support from random Canadian skaters, which actually worried me more. This person who maintains the CRDA's Myspace page may also be acting on his own in contacting me, but I do feel better in that he has, like, an official logo. I know nothing of the administrative structure of our neighbors up north, I admit-- I know little enough of our structure here.
Anyhow. I do feel less put-upon and victimized. I got no support from my league in all that because they were all so out of their depth as well (I'm not starting drama, I'm saying no one else knew what to do either), but it just made the whole thing very bitter and icky and I had to shove feelings about it away every time I saw something pertaining to it. I was just thinking about it again because I watched all our bout highlight reels over the weekend...
Egh. Brr. Bleh. But I feel better now. Marginally. Nothing has changed, but the fact that other people are still thinking about it too makes me feel less of a freak, anyway.
My skating is improving, everyone says. Funny, I thought it was pretty good by the end of last season, so I didn't realize that my current state is an improvement. I'm still fighting back from a lot of muscle atrophy, and feel very weak. But as with most things, if I come into it believing I can do it, I do it easily. So I think I convinced myself over the summer I had been an excellent skater last season, so now I'm better than I was...
New wheels, with bearings that actually turn, help too. It's still a little pathetic if you consider it closely, but it doesn't really matter how silly it is, the point is that I'm improving again, and that's good. When your whole life is lived around imaginary blocks in your head that you don't really know are there, it's a cause for joy when you realize you've circumvented another one.
Danny (the Knockouts' new coach) seems to have understood a bit of the way I work, too-- I was skating all shitty, leaning out of the corners so I lost control and went wide in the straightaways, and he was attempting to convince me to drop my shoulder into the turns, and I didn't get what he was saying. Then we did a drill where we skated the other direction, and I caught on immediately that I had to lead myself around the corner with my right shoulder. So when we went back to the proper direction, I was easily steering myself into the corners with my left shoulder. I remember learning that last season, and I had thought I was doing it, but obviously, every time I get distracted, I forget about it, and it's worse because I think I'm already doing it so it can't be what's messing me up.
So he said, "I'm just going to make you skate the opposite direction before every bout to remind you how to skate right."
And i thought it over. I only learned to cross over properly during a reverse skate at Depew last year. "That would probably be ideal," I said.
"Well," he said, "it forces you to reconsider everything, and realize what you're doing wrong."
I'm just not very aware of my body at the best of times. And skating is not really the best of times. Particularly not when someone is trying to kick your ass while you're skating. And hundreds of people are watching you. Eck.
I am looking forward immensely to the coming season. I think I've finally got a hope of being in control enough of the basics to actually do something useful on the track, rather than shrieking a lot and getting in the way when I fall down (which, hey, has been useful...). The new girls are an energizing force, and just the fact that they see me as a good influence/ venerable old veteran has changed my own perception of myself. I always saw myself as near the bottom of the group last year, and now I naturally (deservedly or not) see myself as better than all the new girls-- probably because so many of them are so humble and eager when they ask for help, even if they're arguably better skaters than me, but I Was Here Last Year So I Know More (true!). Anyway, as my perception of myself shifts, so my body's willingness to perform tasks I didn't know it could also shifts, is what I'm trying to say.
Eh, I may not be making sense to anyone but myself. But I feel better-- I feel like last year there were many instances when I had the capacity to perform, but did not, because I did not see that it was possible to do anything. I would let the jammer get by because it didn't occur to me that I was capable of hitting her. That kind of thing. I was always good at the demanding tasks that asked me only to compete against myself-- I have always gotten up very quickly from falls, I have always kept up well with the pack, that sort of thing, but I have not multitasked well, and have not done well in competition with other girls. But if I recast the whole thing in my mind, view it differently, there is much I can do easily that I simply did not do last season. Like jamming-- I jammed maybe once in scrimmage last season, and did fine, was fast enough, could keep up, could even be strategic in my use of the lead jam status (I confused the refs by not calling the jam when my opponent hit the pack before me; I explained that I knew she'd get through with 3 points, but I also was pretty confident I had it in me to do at least the same, and meanwhile the clock was running down on our pivot's penalty so next jam we could skate with a full complement). But I didn't really think I could get through the openings, and so I always took the long way through the pack, hitting every blocker and making my own holes when I know there must have been plenty already there if I'd just been confident to assess strategically.)
Anyway, I'm being very boring, I know. But it helps me sort out things in my own head. I wish I could write as eloquently as
rm does about fencing...I'm going to go get to work; there's an unpleasant task awaiting me and I just don't feel like dealing with it, but I really can't procrastinate any more. Bleh.
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no subject
Date: 2007-10-22 04:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-22 04:25 pm (UTC)Also it explains why they were so down on me when, yeah, I didn't think I'd posted anything that inflammatory-- they were shutting me down so I wouldn't complain so much that their chances of getting other leagues to play them weren't damaged.
I don't know how deliberate this is on their part, or whether they're just ignorant, but it takes on a more sinister cast when you discover that there have been repeated complaints, and not just by us.
In short, the problem is not us. We may not have dealt with it perfectly, but it was a situation we had every right not to expect. So, good for us. And I still think we did the best we, as a group, could have done; individuals had their own failings, but as a group we were remarkably cohesive, loyal, and even courageous, and have every right to be proud of what small things we did accomplish.
I feel more free to feel better about the whole thing, if that makes any sense, and take what consolation I can.
Again, I don't know how official it really is, but the fact that someone else still cares means, again, it's not my failing, or not just my failing.