Wedding Blog

Secret?!? Ummmm… I’ve been thinking long and hard about which secret(s) to divulge to the hive, and I think I am just going to say it! Besides the fact that I am a nail biter, theatre nerd, and coffee addict, Mr. Cookie and I lead a double life. That’s right, a la Mr. and Mrs. Smith, Mr. Cookie and I are covert, secret government agents. We rid the world of evil doers one criminal at a time! Yeah, not so much!

All kidding aside, my secret has to do with a squashed childhood dream. Some kids dream of being a doctor, lawyer, president, or veterinarian. Well, this cookie dreamed of becoming a professional figure skater. That’s right, at the ripe age of 5 I started reaching for Olympic gold!

When I was a wee cookie, ice skating was my LIFE! By age 7, I had a private coach and would practice about an hour per day, and by age 10 I practiced about three hours a day. Yeah, I was pretty hard core about figure skating. I wanted to grow-up to be the next Dorothy Hamill (notice my Hamill hair-do), Kristi Yamaguchi, and Nancy Kerrigan.

A little after I started competing, the unthinkable happened. I would like to say that I broke my arm doing a triple salchow, double toe, triple-double-quad combination. Not so much. I broke my arm on my backyard swing set trying to be a jungle-gym monkey. Surgery, a pin, and a cast later I was banned from the ice for a few months. After that, my figure skating career went south.

Sorry to disappoint, but this isn’t one of those stories where the heroine heals and gets back on the horse. After I broke my arm, I developed a slight phobia of falling. Ever fallen on ice? It hurts like a B#*%H!!! When I got back on the ice I started learning and perfecting jumps, but I couldn’t get up the nerve to jump. I would remember the pain associated with breaking my arm and chicken out. After getting a sixth place out of six competitors because I didn’t complete any of my jumps, my skating career was over.

Every once and a while I’ll break out my skates and get out on the ice, but just for fun. I’m still trying to get Mr. Cookie out on the ice, but he’s afraid he’ll twist his ankle. Although no Olympic gold for this Cookie, figure skating is a childhood memory that I will always cherish. But most importantly, I’ve got some pretty funny pictures of me in skating costumes as wonderful momentos of my glory days on the ice.

Anybody else have squashed childhood dreams they would like to share?