Mid-life crisis? Been there, done that.
I'm 53 and learnt basic skating forwards and backwards 25 years ago. Last summer after years not skating, I started skating again and tried to learn properly. I needed exercise, and 10km cross country runs were doing my knees in, much to my annoyance as I love running. Almost a year later, and I can now do basic moves such as cross overs and hockey stops, both backwards and forwards, but with lots of room to improve, and I have started learning to play hockey. I reckon I've learnt quite slowly, in part because I used my old rubbish skates till late last year, and because I bought new skates which were much too big and incorrectly sharpened causing several painful injuries, not serious fortunately. I now have excellent skates, properly sharpened, so no more excuses.
Life now seems so short, and I hope to get good before the Gods decide that I've had too much fun, and bring it all to an end. How does one please the Gods? Must rush, I have a goat and sharp knife to collect.