Winners Sometimes Lose

That's my great uncle Jerry and his life partner Kurt during their performance rollerskating days. No, not really. I just searched Google images for "roller skating", and that came up.
Anyway, I brought up rollerskating because I would like to share a childhood story of mine with all five of my readers. Back in my elementary school days, I would go roller skating with my father most Friday nights. That was the big thing in Lilburn Georgia, the flashy rollerskatin' rink with it's neon-clad walls, black carpeting laced with glow-in-the-dark swirls, and a glittering disco ball in the center to top it all off. On Friday, the rink was at it's busiest, crowded with kids and adults alike. Songs like, "This Is How We Do It", and "No Scrubs", made up most of the Dj's play list. But unfortunately, "The Macarena", and "The Hokey Pokey" were both played at least once during the course of the night. Everyone did the Macarena while rollerskating, and formed a huge circle for the Hokey Pokey. I remember participating a couple of times, but I soon learned it was more fun to watch people stumble whilst shaking their butt during the Macarena, and fall on their backs whilst lifting limbs in and out of the circle during the Hokey Pokey.

Every night they would clear the rink for a while to hold racing contests for different age groups. Both my father and I would compete, and so would this other kid and HIS dad, I'm pretty sure his name was Michael. We weren't really friends, but we weren't mortal enemies, or rivals or anything like that either, he was just in a couple of my classes at school. He took his rollerskating pretty seriously. He had these aero-dynamic roller blades with neon, glow-in-the-dark wheels(as most everything did that was considered cool back then), and took first place in our age group almost always. But what makes this kid stick in my mind after all these years is one of the few instances that I saw him lose.

After one race, as I was coming off the rink, I saw Michael hugging his dad CRYING, presumably about the race he had just taken second place in. And to think I had once looked up to him all those years at the skating rink, often marveling at his ability to round corners without losing speed. I mean, I often got third or second place in those races, but I never felt the need to cry about it afterwards. It's not like there was a trophy in store for you, or eternal glory, just a short round of applause, a coupon for the snack bar, and maybe your name called over the loudspeaker. I wasn't about to lose face over free nachos..