Inline Skate Across the Country

8 states, 2,736.20 miles, and 54 days.

It's been 4 years now since I finished my cross country skate and my ankles are still feelin it. Within those 4 years, I've never actually got to write about the experience other than a post Q & A article I did for Rollerblade (I have tea with them). So, let's back track to 2015.

It was winter time and I had just moved to Portland, OR 6 months prior. After one semester of taking classes at Portland Community College (and failing math), I decided I don't want to pursue that form of education further. That same time, I began to take my hobby of photography more seriously and chose to go down that path.

Since I had a little more time on my hands without school, I had more time to go out and play. I met this guy named Justyn (we are still friends to this day!) and we quickly became close buddies.

One evening, on my way to his apartment, I saw a box of random stuff laying outside the dumpster by his complex. I genuinely love diggin through trash and seeing what cool stuff lies within but this combination was something elese. It was a mask of president Nixon, a book on how to build a time machine, and a pair of shitty inline skates that were 4 sizes too large for me. I left the mask but did take the book and skates and quickly put them in my car before I met up with Justyn.

Proceeding our hang, I wasted no time to begin my skating frenzy. When I got to my apartment building, I placed the oversized skates on my feet and went up and down the carpeted halls. I was not good but I loved it.

The next day, I felt ready to take my skating into the outside world. That confidence lasted about thirty seconds before I wiped out. I didn’t mind falling—I knew it was part of the process—but Portland is nothing but hills, and trying to skate them felt like a suicide mission. I ended up feeling a little defeated and going back inside.

Later on, I found myself mindlessly scrolling through the dating apps in my new city. I swiped past a bunch of profiles before I saw him: a ginger haired, freckled boy…named Ryan. At the time in my life, I thought it would be so fun to date someone with the same name as me (nowadays, I wouldn’t even try).

We matched quickly, and it didn’t take many messages before I mentioned my attempted skating adventure that day.

“I know how to skate,” he said. Then, almost immediately: “What if our first date is me teaching you?”

Cute boy AND a skating lesson. Sign me up.

The very next day, we met up.

Everything was happening so fast—finding the skates one day, finding a skating teacher the next, and now heading out for my first real lesson. Was this fate?

We took to the streets of the city and Ryguy patiently stayed by my side as I struggled to stay upright. He showed me how to balance, how to turn, and different ways to stop. We skated for four hours that day, and by the end, I felt like a pro.

That relationship was short-lived, but my love for inline skating was not. For the next week, I pushed myself further and further, skating everywhere I went. Eventually, though, just skating around the city didn’t feel like enough. It was then that I sat down, opened my laptop, and typed into Google: “Inline skate across the country world record.”

(idk what the bruce things was about)

If anyone knows me, they know I dive realllllly deep into things… and reallllllly fast. Some hobbies fade, but others stick for the long haul. Another known knowledge about me: I’m very all-or-nothing. It’s either skate across the country and attempt to break a world record—or don’t skate at all. Super rational, right?

Then came the Google search. Someone else had done it. And just like that, I hit the point of no return: I am going to skate across the country one day.

Fast Forward

The year was 2017, my second year living in Austin, TX. One spring afternoon, I threw a big going-away party for my boyfriend at the time, before he moved back to New Jersey. My sister and his brother were also visiting, and I went all out—preparing a ton of food and inviting all our friends to come perform in my backyard.

I was walking to the front of my house to greet someone who had just arrived when I noticed my neighbor fixing a motorcycle in his driveway. I’d seen him many times before, but he always seemed reserved—never the type to start a conversation nor want to be bothered.

That day, though, I was feeling cheerful and wanted as many people as possible to come celebrate. So I walked over and introduced myself.

“Hey, I’m Ryan. I’m your neighbor! I’ve seen you around and apologies for never saying hi. I’m having a party next door—we’ve got a lot of food and music if you’d like to join!”

The bushy-haired man stopped what he was doing and looked up at me.

“Hey, I’m Scott. Sounds fun, I’d love to join.”

And just like that, it became the start of one of the best friendships of my life.

The next few months after that party were very dark times for me.

My first—and still only—boyfriend, the one I had thrown the party for and spent months helping prepare for his move, ended our relationship. Just days before my flight home to see her, my only remaining grandparent, Nana Kitty, passed away. When I returned for her funeral, my dad was in the process of selling our childhood home, and I had to pack up the last of my belongings and say goodbye to a place that held eighteen years of memories.

After my time in Pennsylvania, I flew back to Austin and completely sank under the weight of everything at once. I felt nothing at all. I wasn’t only grieving the death of my grandmother—I was also grieving the loss of someone I loved deeply. Alongside that grief came an endless rain of guilt for feeling more devastated by my breakup than by my Nana’s passing.

I think, in some ways, losing someone who willingly leaves your life can feel harder than losing someone to death. One person didn’t choose to leave you. The other did.

In this era of depression, I began spending a lot of time with Scott—who I quickly started calling Scotty. We both had an exact moment when we realized our friendship was going to stick. Scotty came over to my place and we got into my car to head to a bluegrass night at Radio. When I turned the car on, the volume was up very loud and one of my favorite bands blasted through the speakers: The B-52’s.

I barely knew Scotty at that point, and I suddenly felt embarrassed to be caught listening to the oddity of “Planet Claire.” If you’ve never heard it, it’s a strange mix of surf rock, new wave, and aliens. As quickly as it came on, I turned it off.

“Wait—was that The B-52’s?” Scotty asked.
“I love them,” he said

Over time, our friendship only grew.

Despite me moving away a year later—and Scotty eventually relocating to San Diego—we stayed close. During that time, I shared with him a dream I’d had for a long while: skating across the country. I asked if he’d ever consider joining me.

Naturally, like any logical human hearing that sentence, he brushed it off. I understood. It sounded far-fetched, and a lot of people talk about big dreams they never actually intend to follow through on. But this was different for me. After maybe the fifth or sixth time I brought it up, I finally got an “Okay.”

Training began in mid-2020. I moved to Philadelphia during COVID to try out the city while living with a friend. During those months, I did strength training almost every day, alternating long runs with my friend and long-distance skating sessions on my own.

I didn’t really know what I was doing. I’d been an athlete my entire life—but not a skate-across-the-country kind of athlete. The person who held (and still holds) the record was a professional tower runner named Kacie Fischer—someone who races up stairwells of skyscrapers. She completed the trip in 49 days. In my naïve mind, I thought that would be easy to beat.

I reached out to her on Instagram and was surprised to get a response. I asked for advice on training and what to expect. Very early in the conversation, it became clear that my experience would be vastly different from hers. She had trained for nearly two years with a professional skater and had a support vehicle following her the entire way.

At the time—and still—I wasn’t even a good skater. This isn’t modesty either; ask Scotty and he’ll agree. I couldn’t do tricks, could only t-stop on one side, and was absolutely terrified of going down steep hills. But there was three things I did have: motivation, endurance, and stubbornness!

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To Be Continued……