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First of all, thanks to everyone for the excited well-wishes on the Wall Street Journal front page article. It is awesome to get a tremendous national spotlight shown on what we do as skaters who continue to compete no matter what their age is. I know that Betsy McKay had a plethora of information to go through — more than can be truly distilled down and fit into one single article. Betsy, thank you for pursuing this story and introducing the public at large to our passion.

There are so many stories of competitors who participate in Adult Nationals in spite of tremendous obstacles of serious disease, injury, and economic struggles. All skaters spend a tremendous amount of energy, effort, creativity, and income on this sport like many a golfer or distance runner might do. I suspect there might be a few more articles about our division of the sport of figure skating in the future.

Terryl Lee Allen, Betsy’s eyes lit up when I introduced you to her and she found the magic of you… and now she has one of your glorious medals. As they state, “For your passion to skate and your courage to compete.” I can’t speak for Betsy, but I can’t think of a better token that encapsulates the spirit of our competition.

I am proud to call figure skating much more than an outlet for a costumed two-minute spot of creativity. This frozen sport has provided me with a broader community of people I would’ve never met and cherished if I stayed in my own narrow circles of work and location.

I would be missing an entire facet of my life — and for that I’m eternally grateful to those pioneers of the Adult Skating program for getting together 20 years ago to form this ‘convention’ of national competition, a special yearly celebration of our love to skate. Those pioneers should never be forgotten for their trail blazing efforts.

http://online.wsj.com/news/article_email/SB10001424052702304049904579515651033733362-lMyQjAxMTA0MDIwOTEyNDkyWj

Puppi and the very Icey Day

Puppi was put on a really strict diet. One can of food a day – half in the morning with pills, repeat at night.

No treats.

The combination of diet and steroids has made for one very cranky Puppi.

As I tried to figure out what I had to do to satiate Puppi’s well-being, I was off to the cast and crew screening of a short film I made, Breaking Ice.  Appropriately enough, I had crew gifts made that were mood cups that changed color when cold…

Icey.

Coming back from the rink where the screening was held, I literally stumbled on the cure to his chewiness… Ice Cubes.  (I fell carrying the ice chest that contained them, and ending up using the cubes to ice my shins.)

He used them to teeth as a puppy-Pupp, and now they cooled his anger towards the diet.

Ice is usually thought of as cold and unforgiving, but using it in tiny chunks made Puppi’s life right now more warm and inviting.

Yay Ice!