In elementary school and middle school I had a major thing for the roller rink.

My friends and I would bedazzle ourselves in matching scrunchies, leggings and skate-laces and pray like hell that our brace-faced 10-year-old boyfriends wouldn’t try to kiss us during the couples skate. The rink was what we’d call radical, and not just because the DJ was pumping M.C. Hammer or Debbie Gibson on repeat. On our skates, as we went flowing and whirring around that shiny, circular floor, we may not have realized it, but we got free, had fun and felt powerful.

Historically speaking, when I think of roller derby girls, I think of brutish, badass, thug-like women with no sense of humor or social charm. Admittedly, I’m a girly girl of a woman, and a southern woman, at that. I was taught to sashay more so than to walk and to never leave home without first smearing on a smile and pressing out my clothes. I’m strong, but even still, I’ll let some big guy carry my boxes when they’re heavy. Why the hell not?! I’m a woman, damn it! I embrace my femininity and I enjoy the comforts of my somewhat softer identity.

Let’s face it, I’ll never be the kind of gal to strap on mounds of spandex and go whipping around a roller rink with the devil in my eye, hunting down some equally pleather-clad sister on wheels. However, I’m curious about these women and I believe in investigating that which we don’t understand. So, I venture out to the derby with an open mind and an open heart and pray like hell not to piss any of those derby girls off.

The announcer at the season opener roller derby bout between The Dominion Derby girls and The River City Rollergirls is a diminutive man in an oversized suit jacket, jeans and flip flops. He talks like the micro-machines guy and is hyper the way small terriers are as he bops around the rink and shouts into the microphone that he wants to “bring back being cool to cheer.” I don’t know what the hell he’s talking about at first, because I didn’t know it ever got uncool to cheer, but I catch his drift when he launches into his next spiel: “Remember what it was like to be a kid and race around your backyard, freely? You’d play cops and robbers and you’d win! You’d catch the bad guy because you could. Remember that joy? We want you to remember that tonight!” I look beyond him and, as if standing in defense of this very purpose, are the fiercest looking females in the room: The Dominion Derby girls or, as I’ve affectionately renamed them: The Double D’s.

The Dominion Derby girls are not at all a motley crew. In fact, they are, many of them, quite pretty and even striking, to tell you the truth. Yes, they’re all stitched up in ripped tights and spandex, booty shorts and knee pads that I recognize as the standard derby girl uniform. But they surprise me with their makeup and ribbons in their hair, pink laces and sassy skirts.

I land an interview with one of their team captains, a woman who calls herself Thunder Lips and is, I have to say, downright adorable. She’s rocking blonde pigtails, and has giant blue eyes. She tells me, in fact, that she’s a mother of three. The DD girls are her family, she says. They practice together four nights a week. Together, they staff and set up every bout from start to finish. While at one time they had star players, they now share centerstage as a unit and do not promote or encourage front runners. No names in bright lights. No drama. No bullshit. Just the team motto: Skate Fast. Turn Left. I like the simplicity of the statement and I ask her to tell me more about their style. She tells me, “We knock bitches down,” and I expect to feel intimidated, but instead I sort of want to fist pump and say hell to the yes.

It’s downright inspiring to be in the presence of someone who so openly admits to kicking ass and taking names and, honestly speaking, there’s nothing brute or thug-like about it. I look at her and think: People are mighty. Instantly, she’s my hero.

As the roller derby bout begins, I realize I don’t know what the hell is going on. I don’t get the scoring and I can’t tell who is doing what. Once the girls get going, though, it doesn’t matter anyway. These women are hauling ass at what seems like a zillion miles per hour around the rink. Crouched together in a big cluster, they’re less technical than they are pure force.

Things happen quickly and suddenly: One or the other of them will get flung forward and she’ll shoot ahead of the pack and start scoring and the crowd will begin screaming, and suddenly there’s all this falling. Everyone falls, over and over again. And when they fall, they don’t go down alone, hell no. They take one or two or more of the others down with them and you can see their elbows, hair, knees and asses banging and bumping into one another. But they don’t seem to care. In fact, they barely notice because they get back up so fast it’s almost as if they were never down to begin with. It’s unbelievable to watch. I decide that, actually, they’re not really falling. They’re flying. It’s genius.

The crowd, including me, is riveted and rallying. Looking around, I see everyone from families, moms with babies and bratty teenagers with scowls and cell phones; to hipsters; to beer-gutted, bearded men without smiles sitting beside tattooed, pierced punks in skinny jeans and dirty hair. Together, we are starstruck and pinned to our spots. In fact, I’m so involved that I forget I’m standing in heels, smashed between about a hundred wide-eyed spectators as Pippy Longstalker overtakes Paris Kills and knocks down Orangyna. She’s smiling and laughing and proud, with a glint in her eyes like she’s got a tasty canary in her mouth.

I flash back for a moment to the girl that I was when I played freely, took risks, made fun a priority and wasn’t always watching every step in fear that I might fall. Indeed, the Dominion Derby Girls and the roller derby, for that matter, are inspiring, exciting, enlivening. True, it’s really about knocking bitches down, and that’s the best part. But really it’s what happens before and after they get knocked down–it’s their racing on and racing away with laughter and that daring look. They’ve got bad guys to catch, and they’ll only catch them if they’re flying.