imaginary outfit: going skating

One of my favorite things to do is ice skate. I'm not particularly good at it but I love it just the same. Sean and I usually manage to go three or four times every month during the winter, and whenever we travel to wintery places, we make a point of trying to find a rink.

The most wonderful rink we ever skated at was the Wiener Eislauf-Verein - it's a massive, very old, open-air rink in Vienna. When we were there, the rink was full of older couples in their fifties and sixties, sumptuously turned out - women in ankle-skimming fur coats, and men in heavy wool suits and hats, looking like they had just dropped in for a skate after running errands around the city. They were impeccable skaters. They whizzed by us, gliding together in time to the waltzes that played over the loudspeakers.

If I ever get to go back there, I'll know to dress for the occasion. In a smart skating dress with a nipped-in waist and a high collar, I'd channel Kitty Scherbatsky and the glamour of ice rinks of olden times, and hopefully my beautiful clothes would make people cast a blind eye to my underdeveloped ice skills.