Arienna

Once you join a roller derby team you get to be "Freshmeat", a wee baby roller derby skater wanna be. Some Freshies know how to skate, some are absolute beginners like me. In my league we fall under the domain of Coach Ballz, the nicest (and scariest) person in derby. She's an extremely experienced skate teacher who takes the 40 basic skills you have to learn to get out of Freshmeat and breaks them down into a rotating schedule of increasing difficulty

So invariably what happens is you kind of learn to do a couple things alright and then she throws something New and Quite Scary at you! I spent a lot time being really afraid of falling. I was (still am to an extent) really cautious about trying new things. The first bad fall is the worst but once you get a few dramatic falls under you, you realize it's not actually such a big deal. That's when things start getting good.

Took me a bit to get there and I don't manage to be my best self every day.