The Seal Who Wanted to Skate

The Seal Who Wanted to Skate

Violet was a seal with silvery-gray fur and the biggest, brightest eyes you ever did see. She lived on a chilly rock by the Arctic Ocean with her seal family, where they spent their days diving for fish and basking in the pale northern sun.

But Violet had a secret dream—a dream so unusual that she hadn’t told anyone yet.

One winter morning, while floating on her back in the icy water, Violet spotted something magical happening on the frozen bay nearby. Human children were gliding across the ice, spinning and twirling and laughing with pure joy. They wore special boots with shiny blades underneath.

“They’re skating!” whispered Violet to herself, her whiskers trembling with excitement. “Oh, how I wish I could skate too!”

Her friend Barnaby, a grumpy walrus with magnificent tusks, snorted when she told him. “Seals don’t skate, Violet. Seals swim. That’s what we do. That’s what we’ve ALWAYS done.”

But Violet couldn’t stop thinking about it. That night, under the dancing green ribbons of the Northern Lights, she made a wish on the brightest star. “Please,” she whispered, “help me find a way to skate.”

The next morning, Violet woke to find something extraordinary washed up on her rock—four shimmering, ice-blue shells that sparkled like frozen starlight. When she touched them with her flippers, they stuck fast, one to each flipper!

“Oh my goodness!” Violet gasped. When she tried to waddle to the water, she discovered the shells were incredibly slippery on the ice. She began to slide… and glide… and soon she was moving across the frozen bay!

“I’m skating! I’m actually skating!” she cried with delight.

At first, she wobbled and bumped and flopped onto her round belly more times than she could count. But Violet didn’t give up. She practiced spinning (which made her dizzy), tried jumping (which resulted in some very ungraceful tumbles), and worked on gliding backward (which was trickier than it looked).

Barnaby watched from the water, shaking his great head. “You’ll tire yourself out,” he called. “Come swim with us instead!”

But Violet was determined. She practiced every day as the winter sun made its lazy arc across the sky.

One afternoon, a little girl named Emma came to skate on the bay. She was learning too, and Violet watched as Emma fell down, got back up, fell down again, and kept trying with a brave smile.

“We’re the same, you and I,” Violet thought warmly.

Then Emma’s scarf blew off in the wind, tumbling and dancing across the ice toward a crack in the frozen bay—a crack that was getting bigger! Emma skated after it, not noticing the danger.

“Oh no!” cried Violet. Without thinking, she pushed off with her magical shell-skates and zoomed across the ice faster than she’d ever gone before. She spun around Emma in a perfect circle, using her body to gently guide the little girl away from the dangerous crack.

Emma stopped, startled, staring at the skating seal with amazement.

Violet retrieved the scarf with her mouth and presented it to Emma with a graceful bow—well, as graceful as a seal can bow while wearing magical shell-skates.

Emma giggled with pure delight. “You’re wonderful!” she said, carefully taking her scarf. “You’re the most amazing skater I’ve ever seen!”

Soon, other children came to watch Violet practice. She showed them her spins and slides, and they clapped and cheered. Even Emma’s grandmother, who had been skating since she was a tiny girl, said she’d never seen anything quite so marvelous.

Barnaby finally waddled onto the ice to see what all the fuss was about. When he saw Violet performing a wobbly but beautiful figure-eight, with all the children applauding, even his grumpy expression softened.

“Well,” he admitted, “I suppose seals can do more than just swim. I suppose… I suppose we can do anything if we really want to.”

Violet beamed at him, her whiskers twitching with happiness.

That evening, as the Northern Lights painted the sky in swirls of green and purple, Violet glided peacefully across the moonlit ice. She thought about her magical shells and her new friends and how wonderful it felt to follow her dream.

“Perhaps tomorrow,” she thought happily, “I’ll teach the other seals to skate. And maybe, just maybe, we’ll start something brand new.”

And do you know what? She did exactly that. By spring, the bay was filled with skating seals of all sizes, each wearing their own magical shells that had washed up on the shore—gifts from the sea for those brave enough to dream differently.

Violet had learned something important: just because something has never been done before doesn’t mean it can’t be done. Sometimes, the most wonderful adventures begin when you dare to imagine something new.

And every night after that, Violet fell asleep with a smile on her face, dreaming of tomorrow’s skating beneath the stars.

The End

Sweet dreams, little one. May you always dare to dream as bravely as Violet.

• Tags:
• Animal Stories