It had rained the night before and, as my classmate fluidly sailed past me on the slick asphalt path, my reaction was that I had witnessed a miracle. It was my first time seeing a pair of Heelys. The first messiah had walked on water—could the second one glide inexplicably across wet pavement?
Yet it wasn’t a religious miracle I experienced, but one of science and unrivaled human innovation. My classmate was not sliding unassisted, but wearing shoes with wheels in the heels. The efficiency of Heelys is what I love most about them. Without Heelys, I’ve been unable to fully capitalize on my potential energy, something eighth grade physics taught me is easily converted into kinetic energy, but anytime I’m at the top of a hill, I have no choice but to wearily trudge down it. If I was sporting a pair of Heelys, I’d be able to sail effortlessly down the hill.
I know why I love Heelys, but even after talking to a friend’s 13 year-old brother, I still have no idea what makes little kids hot for them, though I’m guessing it’s not kinetic energy.
Dallas, my friend’s brother, had two words for me when I asked if he owned a pair of Heelys.
“Ew, no.”
“Do any of your friends own Heelys?” I ventured.
“Yeah,” he laughed. “Maybe like in fourth grade.”
I pointed out their efficiency and functionality, but Dallas wouldn’t budge, and I hung up, feeling the least cool I had felt since junior high.
Calling shoe stores across the country didn’t shed any light on the matter either. I asked Jasmine, an employee of a shoe store in San Francisco, why little children buy Heelys, only to be informed that their customer base mainly consisted of European tourists. I guess England has finally figured out why they lost the Revolutionary War.
When I talked to my sister about Heelys, she told me that in China, street vendors everywhere sell little wheels that you can clip onto your shoes to convert them into a makeshift pair of Heelys. No wonder China has one of the fastest growing economies in the world.
But if I like Heelys so much, why don’t I own a pair? My best guess is that I’m afraid of change. The purchase of a pair of Heelys would radically transform my life in a way that I don’t know if I could handle. It might be too much of a good thing.
Consider: I’d arrive five minutes earlier than I normally would. What would I do with all this extra time? Would I get more done or would my life become bloated with empty little chunks of time? I’d have to get a whole new group of friends who could keep up with me. They’d either have to be faster than my current friends—some members of the cross country team, maybe—or they’d have to buy Heelys too. What would happen to all my old slow friends? On top of those concerns, I don’t know if I want to regularly wear an item primarily targeted at six-year-olds, despite their brilliant design.
Luckily, my hesitation to buy a pair hasn’t slowed Heelys’ success. The company had its IPO in early December and the stock has already shot up more than 80 percent. Every day I go into the city, I see more and more kids with Heelys. Maybe I’ll be able to overcome my reservations and join them someday, sliding and gliding down M Street past crowds of tourists, leading the way into the future.
