The Shallow Depth of Youth
I looked out over the area that was our ice skating pond when I was a kid. The clubhouse, wooden sidewalk and side rails were still there. Later, someone told me they had been refurbished a couple years back.
Forty plus years ago I learned to ice skate here. I was looking at weeds, tumbled grass and muddy ruts. The thing that got my attention was that the area of the pond was only about 6-8 inches from the edge of surrounding field. I was trying to get my mind around it. "This thing backs up and gets less than a foot deep." I realized to myself.
At the same time I realized that when I skated here there was always a hint of fear that someone would break through the ice and drown in the dark depths below. Drown or be carried under thick ice in the swift current that ran like a freight train below the frigid rink. But there were no dark depths and no current at all.
It is difficult to describe the feelings of ignorant deception. I was ignorant of the specific dimensions of that pond and thus lived with a deception about it. In this case it likely worked for the good, because all of the kids were perhaps more careful. However, the truth is that if anyone had broken through they would have been wet up to their knees and got their skates muddy. The illusion of depth created a greater thrill of skating.
Sometimes when the pond was crowded we'd talk about the "what-if" factor of extra weight. What if 20 or more of us got close to the end by the dam? Questions and fear factors gave a chill and a heightened sense of adventure. Stories circulated of previous years that had seen drownings by unfortunate kids that played too wild or got too close to thin ice. No one drowned in that place but that didn't stop the stories.
Standing there, looking out over my newly discovered marsh land that gets backed up in Winter, I came to realize a number of things concerning childhood. One is the potential for safety that innocent deception can lend to the ignorant and another is how sweet the memory of my ignorance actually is. I'm glad I didn't know we all skated on a huge frozen puddle.
Forty plus years ago I learned to ice skate here. I was looking at weeds, tumbled grass and muddy ruts. The thing that got my attention was that the area of the pond was only about 6-8 inches from the edge of surrounding field. I was trying to get my mind around it. "This thing backs up and gets less than a foot deep." I realized to myself.
At the same time I realized that when I skated here there was always a hint of fear that someone would break through the ice and drown in the dark depths below. Drown or be carried under thick ice in the swift current that ran like a freight train below the frigid rink. But there were no dark depths and no current at all.
It is difficult to describe the feelings of ignorant deception. I was ignorant of the specific dimensions of that pond and thus lived with a deception about it. In this case it likely worked for the good, because all of the kids were perhaps more careful. However, the truth is that if anyone had broken through they would have been wet up to their knees and got their skates muddy. The illusion of depth created a greater thrill of skating.
Sometimes when the pond was crowded we'd talk about the "what-if" factor of extra weight. What if 20 or more of us got close to the end by the dam? Questions and fear factors gave a chill and a heightened sense of adventure. Stories circulated of previous years that had seen drownings by unfortunate kids that played too wild or got too close to thin ice. No one drowned in that place but that didn't stop the stories.
Standing there, looking out over my newly discovered marsh land that gets backed up in Winter, I came to realize a number of things concerning childhood. One is the potential for safety that innocent deception can lend to the ignorant and another is how sweet the memory of my ignorance actually is. I'm glad I didn't know we all skated on a huge frozen puddle.
posted by Simba Huru at
11:49 AM
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