Skateboarding

I grew up skateboarding, (if you’re reading this, you likely did as well) not like the millions of other kids who played some standardized sport, who’s mom or dad had to drive them to practice. I could skate right outside my house:  in the driveway, the sidewalk, and especially the street.  It was my means of transportation, my way of getting across town or to the gas station for a snack. That skateboard became an everyday part of me.

                It now seems that this way of life, of growing up, has become much more rare. Kids aren’t using their boards to get anywhere.  It’s all about the tricks.  I don’t know.  Maybe it’s a generational thing.  It seems all I see are skaters rolling up to an obstacle, trying/doing their trick, and then rolling back to the start.  (I blame SLS). Watching them, seeing their awkward pushes, barely staying on the board – balance is an afterthought, and then – the most atrocious trick, it all seems, looks, IS so ugly and uninspiring.  So few are the skaters that aren’t worried about “doing tricks”.  So few are the ones that  push with a natural grace and athleticism, as if born with a board attached to their feet.  Just by how they stand on their boards, rolling as if a manifestation of the wind itself, these rare skaters – these few and far between, represent the humanistic beauty of this athletic endeavor.

 I complain about the rarity of style.  But reading over these words, I’m starting to come around a bit.  We might need these tricksters.  Not for stoke or hype, but as a contrast.  Without something so ugly, how can we be expected to see the beautiful?