I joined Vette City Roller Derby in 2009, when I still lived in the backwater of Bowling Green, KY. Best thing that ever happened to me in BG was when some Corvettes fell into a sinkhole. No, I mean, when I joined roller derby. I did not learn that exercise or even sports could be fun until I was on roller skates.
When I picked a place to live and work in New Zealand I created a map of the active roller derby leagues in the country, so that when I landed I would have a built-in group of humans I could count on to chat about at least this one super specific topic.
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| DED, Christchurch's roller derby team welcomed me right away. Yes their practice space is sometimes bitter cold, yes their officials crew has a long shared history, yes I'm the go-to person to ask questions about American political WTF-ery, but they're not clique-y, they value my ref skills, and they treat me as part of the team. This is the antidote to some toxic and chilly-ass roller derby culture I have encountered. |
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| This is the only selfie I took during a triple-header in June where I was on skates for about 4 hours. I was stuffing my face with mandarin orange slices. I reffed the Team NZ practice the next day, so another hour on skates. |
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| Someone brought a lamb to roller derby practice. His name was Fresh Meat and as you can see he wore a tiny diaper. I still don't have a full explanation for why he needed to come to derby practice, but he belonged to one of the junior skaters. |
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| Surprisingly sweet face. He was unbothered by the whistles and the chaos of the game. |
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| Team Official from the Christchurch area are the nicest derby folks I've worked with. |
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