I'm looking at the man in the mirror.

Something peculiar happens when people get out on artificial ice. A few nights ago, John and I were part of a handful of brave souls that took to the Rockefeller rink during one of those annoying rain spells you don't realize is saturating you to the core until suddenly your pants are soaked and people are laughing and pointing... or, wait, that's something else entirely...

There was the requisite gaggle of silly girls, the kind that completely baffled me in high school, who giggle loudly and make this giant scene, oblivious to the creeps who leer in the shadows at them.

There was the grumpy father and his 10 year old daughter, who toppled over with the swiftness of a general motors factory and got sort of put off by his daughter, who wouldn't stop laughing at her poor, clumsy pops, and so he just stayed put, watching her fly around the ring like a Quidditch player on speed, grumbling and wobbling some more.

And then there was the gang of be-pimpled skaters. Landsharks with mullets. Lanky, hulking, awkward teenage boys with earphones and cliche emblems of attitude on their jackets who zoomed around like no one else existed, zooming toward you and then skidding to a halt just as you were cringing with your eyes clamped tight, giving a voice-cracked "Huh huh," in a blade-made flurry of diced ice. Ducking and weaving between people who were already tottering around uncertainly. One-upping each other, sort of giving each other looks of, "Yeah man. Killer-ass triple lutz."

I don't know if there's a skating underbelly in NYC. After all, so many residents of that city are, like me, from places that don't even freeze over in the winter. But it seems that the other night in that space, people reverted to their more primitive social circles, with the alpha male reigning supreme as "Man in the Mirror" played loudly over the man-created ice.