In the currently relevant Broadway musical "Ragtime," with music by Stephen Flaherty and lyrics by Lynn Ahrens, an immigrant father comforts his frightened daughter by showing her a flipbook of ice skaters, while singing a gentle song called "Gliding."
The image is soothing for a reason. Ice skaters gliding is a perfect metaphor for motion without resistance.
For years, I was taught that skating worked because the pressure of the blades melted the ice, making "pirouettes, figure eights, and silver skates" possible. But modern science tells a more subtle — and more interesting — story.
In reality, even in cold weather, a microscopic film of slippery water naturally exists on the surface of ice. This ultra-thin layer forms before a skate ever touches it. As the blade moves, heat generated by motion helps sustain that film, allowing the skate to slide smoothly forward rather than scrape and stop.
The blade itself plays an important role. Skate blades are slightly curved and hollowed underneath, which concentrates force along their narrow edges. That focused contact allows skaters to grip the ice for turns and spins, while also increasing the thin layer of water beneath them. As speed increases, so does the heat from motion, creating a faster, smoother surface to glide upon.
Temperature matters, too. When temperatures rise, ice turns soft and mushy, absorbing energy instead of returning it, and gliding feels sluggish and unstable. When it’s too cold, there’s too little surface melting, and the ice feels hard, noisy, and resistant beneath the blade. But at moderate temperatures, everything aligns — and skating can feel nearly effortless, like floating.
In "Ragtime," the song "Gliding" is about more than ice or motion. It suggests that artistic creativity and resilience — especially in times of uncertainty and fear — can reduce the friction of the world around us. Like a skater finding the right balance of speed and surface, art can help us keep moving forward, carrying hope with grace into better days ahead.
