Tonya Skates on Hard Ice

12/23/1998 at 12:00 AM EST

Tonya Harding is ready for a chilly response when she glides back onto the ice. "I'm sure there are people who do not want me back in the skating world," she told the Associated Press. "But that's their problem. Skating is my life. It's all I know." Harding is set to make her professional debut next week at an arena in West Virginia, where she'll twirl and leap to the sounds of ZZ Top while wearing a turquoise and purple dress. "I'm very excited that I got this second chance," she said. "If something comes from this, great, but if it doesn't, that's OK, too." Implicated in the 1994 attack on rival skater Nancy Kerrigan, Harding, 28, is banned by the U.S. Figure Skating Association from competing in an amateur event. The Association has no jurisdiction over professional events.