Too Clumsy for Roller Shoes?

I was at the grocery store last night, and I’m strolling over to find the plastic bags and Tupperware which were placed in a really obscure isle that made no sense, and I see this little girl glide by with her mom. I said glide, you notice, b/c she’s not walking – she’s holding onto the cart and just rolling long on these newfangled contraptions that I have noticed over the past couple years that make me really insanely jealous.

Have you seen these things? They are shoes…but they have wheels built into the bottom in a way that you can just tilt your feet and they convert into temporary roller skates. I’m not sure if I’m describing them that well, but I can't get a pic to upload, so you'll have to check them out on the In-Ter-Net for yourself. It’s nuts actually cuz I googled them and I typed in “roller shoes” just on a hunch and guess what: they really are called roller shoes!!! Wait hold up. I guess they are also called “heeleys.” How clever. Ok anyway, I always feel like I see kids in airports wearing this things.

As bad as I want them, my guess is I’d totally have busted my ass if I’d had a pair as a kid. Don’t kids still fall down all the time like they used to? It was normal to have skinned knees all the time right? I think I must have fallen off my bike racing through gravelly streets like at least once every two weeks. I think I remember taking particularly bad spills when I’d go rollerblading with my dog and let him pull me. When that dog got distracted and took off I was totally screwed and there was nothing I could do but go with it and know a fall was in my near future.

Granted, I suppose that I’m kind of clutzy – I actually did run my cart into the corner of a bread display last night when I turned my head to watch the girl on her roller shoes – and I have no balance in the morning when I first wake up in the morning and usually run into a bedpost or something – but I still think those things have to be dangerous.

And to close, I must say that I just can’t afford to be endangering my limbs at this point. My legs already look like two battlefields right now. I’ve got those bites from the bugs from hell on my thighs from hiking, I’ve got blisters from my fabulous hot but not so fabulous comfortable new shoes, I’ve got huge cutty-type things on ankles from my 10 year old rollerblades, and I have a large bruise on my left knee cap from I don’t know, probably bumping into something when I woke up one morning last week.

So it’s sad, cuz I really want some of those roller shoes, but it’s just not in the cards. Although you know, my birthday is around the corner and if someone bought me a pair I prolly won’t turn them away…