new plan: i saw it in the distance but it hit me in the face anyway.

soooooo, this weekend, on saturday, i was like, hmmm, there's roller derby happening in a nearby suburb. hmmmm, let's see how nearby it is. hmmmm. a five dollar round trip train ride. hmmmm, why not i guess? (other than the obvious reasons of homework?)

and so i went and watched the women's flat track derby association (wftda) eastern regionals competition. i watched the steel city ladies positively punish providence rhode island and north carolina beat montreal by two soundly disputed points (for the fifth place spot).

and oh, yeah, i fell in love and met my future wife.

but really. i knew i would love roller derby but i hadn't ever seen it live and it was like seeing too much light for the first time. i went, "that. i want to do that. i need to be a part of that."

and then, when i got back to my house i bought tickets for the championship bout today.

new york city's gotham girls roller derby vs. philadelphia's liberty belles. i was rooting for gotham because - duh. i talked to a couple of the girls yesterday. they are awesome.

when i walked in yesterday to buy my ticket, the lady in the box office asked where i was from. i told her i went to sarah lawrence. she liked this and told me that the westchester "suburbia" team is having try-outs next monday - october 4. NEXT MONDAY!!! i have no skates! i am doing too much silly shit at school!! i want to marry you all and be a part of your lives and be a blocker to your jammer and sew you hot hot hot little derby skins (which are what their hot pants are called).

and then the gotham girls have try-outs on november 20.

i need roller skates.

i met a grad student there who goes to my school and used to do roller derby in madison wisconsin. she's gonna try out for the suburbia team. she's gonna practice skating on our school's tennis courts. we should be friends. her name is harlot bronte.

today was incredible. it was such a good bout. gotham was so fast. just so fast and i their three main jammers were just uncanny. and it was great because today, i understood the scoring and the hand motions and i was totally just able to follow it. so then because i knew what was happening i got really into it and my heart was pounding an i was sitting on the edge of the track and - gah! so much love that my heart got sympathy bruises because it was trying so hard to work its way onto the track!

here are pictures from today:

gotham girls huddle.

the leg with the lightning bolt belongs to bonnie thunders who is an insanely awesome jammer.

liberty belles.

liberty belles (aka: 2nd place!) on their pre-game introductory lap.

gotham takes a knee while the belles are on their introductory lap.

gotham!

after the bout.

#46 is "swede hurt." yesterday she was telling me about seeing bikini kill in 1994 when she was 16 and in america on exchange from sweden.

i talked to beatrix slaughter yesterday for a bit about derby and getting into it. she was super sweet and i love her name.

champs!

2nd place: liberty belles (in blue). 3rd place: charm city (in yellow). 1st place: gotham girls (in black). these three will go to nationals in chicago to skate on november 5, 6, 7. you should go and cheer in my absence.

and a tiny video i took. who wouldn't want to play this sport? it's strategic like football and cool like feminism and craft fairs had a love child at a skate park.

(the whistle at about 19 seconds is tournament mvp hyper lynx being sent to the penalty box. this was one of the few jams where philly got lead jammer. it's a weird moment that i selected to record.)

thing one: i need skates.

thing two: i need to learn to skate really, really well so that

thing three: next fall when i am not so crazy busy i can skate with suburbia or gotham and begin my bruised career as a derby girl.