Start your summer off right at Skates & Stuff
By Ellen Griley

PHOTO by ROSHEILA ROBLES

My first pair of roller skates had white leather boots with magenta laces and matching magenta wheels (with sparkles!)—so damned cute and girly that, looking back, I realize my mother was probably trying to tell her little tomboy something. And I hated them, but not for their color—next to lime green and teal, magenta was my favorite. No, I hated them because in a neighborhood where kids were playing street hockey on inline skates, I was stuck with those stupid, lame, four-wheeled roller skates. La-ame!

But then came June. For my birthday, my mother bought me a bitchen pair of black and white roller blades with purple wheels. And a hot pink hockey stick. Rad!

But then came July. Roller blades, it had been decided, were totally ga-ay. The neighborhood kids were now taking the bus to the beach, where the guys rode boogie boards and the girls flirted with the guys at the KROQ van. I couldn’t go to the beach without an adult, though (“But mo-om!”), so I stayed behind, cruising empty streets on my roller blades (out of guilt), until one day, I stopped. The blades went back in their box, and I, well, I never was allowed to go to the beach—but at least I wasn’t ga-ay.

Those blades might be long gone (the guilt? Clearly, not so much) but summer is back—and how: I haven’t heard so many people talking about their summer plans since the sixth grade. Bike rides and barbecues, Catalina trips and kickball games, this summer is going to be the best one ever. Best of all, it doesn’t matter anymore what you ride—so long as you ride. And I’m going to skate.

Now, when you haven’t roller skated since you were 12, Google becomes your friend: “used roller skates” plus “Long Beach” equals a listing for Joe’s Used Roller Skates, a tiny space (more like a room) that you’ll learn actually goes by Skates & Stuff and shares a roof with a home appliance store. Inside, there’s a wall and a half lined with used skates of every variety: suede skates, leather skates, blue tennis shoe skates, black combat boot skates, brown dress shoe skates.

That’s what Skates & Stuff has specialized in for nearly 25 years—custom roller skates, new and used, built to order. If you’re a novice, it can be slightly overwhelming: indoor wheels? Outdoor wheels? Definitely outdoor for the summer, but what if I want to head indoors in the fall? Come back and we’ll change your wheels, says Little Ricky from behind the counter (Big Ricky Carter, his dad, is the owner). And maintenance? Depends on how much you ride, but generally once a month (tune-ups run $6). A new pair of skates at Skates & Stuff might set you back more than you expect—$138; used go from $85—but, notes Little Ricky, head to big-name sporting goods store and chances are you’ll soon wind up at his place for an upgrade, anyway.

From walk-in to check out, the whole process takes about 20 minutes: after telling Little Ricky my shoe size, he grabs a pair of new, polished, black leather boots—no used skates in my size, he says, or else he would have showed me those first. Then, its on to wheel color (red, blue or white—I go with blue) and assembly. Little Ricky’s little brother Desmond is on hand to help, working the cash register as Ricky cranks and adjusts the wheels on the skates. Some WD-40 here, a credit card swipe there, and my new roller skates are ready for the road.

They won’t be going back in their box anytime soon, either—so long as I can remember how to stop.