Don't call them figure skates

When I was a kid, figure skates were for girls -- boys wore hockey skates. And for those boys whose parents insisted on figure skates, it was like being signed up for ballet instead of baseball.

Talking to the boys in our neighborhood, it seems that things haven't changed that much -- even though there's much more convergence elsewhere, with hockey players seeking out figure skating coaches to refine their edge control and a whole class of hybrid recreational skates combining features of figure skates and hockey skates.

Perhaps it will take a bit of creative renaming: how about "trick skates" instead of "figure skates"? In pretty much every other activity I can think of, doing stunts is the height of boyhood cool -- inline skating, skateboarding, skiing and snowboarding, BMX, etc. I guess it's still difficult to get over all those years of TV coverage of ice dancers in Liberace-esque outfits, though.

Posted by David on November 6, 2006 10:44 AM