It’s not every day you get to learn from a YoYo wizard.
But there I was standing in the presence of greatness, about to get my first official lesson in the art of spinning a yo-yo.
Not only do the father-son team of Andy and Dan McBride sell yo-yos from their new store, YoYo Heaven, but they will also teach you how to get started.
When I was younger, I had a yo-yo. I can still picture that beautiful blue Duncan butterfly I would toss around the house – but that was a long time ago.
After watching Dan, a yo-yo professional, masterfully spin his skill toy in all different directions and make it do just about anything he wanted, I knew I was in the right place to get some tips.
Following a quick tutorial on what the first and likely final lesson of my yo-yo career would be like, I grabbed hold of the Yomega Maverick the McBrides had picked out for me. A couple quick tosses of the Maverick and a hint of how to hold the yo-yo in my hand and how to snap my wrist and I was ready for just about anything.
Up first was the baseline trick that every first time yo-yoer learns – making the yo-yo sleep. This is when the correct snap of the wrist can mean the difference in success or failure. To make the yo-yo sleep, you must force it to the bottom of its string and maintain a spin. If you are able to keep the yo-yo spinning for a few seconds, the next step is to pull up quickly on the string and catch it in your hand.
The first couple attempts were what I would chalk up as my learning curve, but it didn’t take long to master the first trick on what will surely blossom into my path to official yo-yo wizardry.
Walking the dog was the next step in the process and required adding a step to the initial trick. Once I got the whole sleeping thing down, I was then charged with making my yo-yo roll along the carpeted floor of YoYo Heaven before once again snapping the spinning toy back to my waiting hand. Again, it was a bit of trial and error before I once again mastered what the McBrides were asking for.
I was gaining confidence and felt anything was possible with that Maverick in my grasp. But the third trick was one that seemed quite foreign for someone who had not picked up a yo-yo for many years. It was called rock the baby. It involved not only getting the yo-yo to sleep, but grabbing the string and making a triangle with it, before getting the still spinning yo-yo to float in between the string.
I took this one step-by-step. First I got the triangle part down. Once I was confident in my abilities, I was able to focus more on what the yo-yo was doing. Getting it to glide between the strings was the easier part. The not so easy part was dropping it with enough speed to allow me to pull it back to my hand. It took multiple tries, but soon I was nailing it left and right (or at least twice).
But that is where my success came to a close. I tried looping, where you toss the yo-yo straight in front of you and get it to loop back around with a circular motion of your wrist. This did not go as well, including one of my attempts that resulted in the yo-yo glancing of the right side of my face.
Overall though, it was not a bad way to spend part of my Friday afternoon. It brought me back to those days with my blue butterfly. And all I can say is that with a little practice, I’m quite certain I could give the younger McBride a run for his money.
