An Ode to Skateboarding in the City (9/27/25): 

   This year I’ve gotten back to nourishing my profound love of skateboarding. As a kid, I had a Bart Simpson-esque shark board with hot pink wheels that said RADICAL on the deck, was obsessed with old TransWorld mags from Half-Price books, playing Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, watching Rocket Power, and messing around with my skater buddies on lil curbs in the neighborhood. I skated most of my 20s, shortly after moving to NYC (cruiser/uptown hill bomber mostly), and did not for most of my 30s, assuming I was too old to keep pushing. But I found out that’s a damn lie, and that skating truly is more than just a physical activity.

   Earlier this year, a late winter/early spring bout of seasonal dysthymia and existential boredom was cured by simply going out for a skate one Sunday. And that has since turned into me skating most days of the week ever since. I haven’t felt this kind of playful joy in years, am getting more limber than ever when I most need to, and learned there’s a reason we eventually come back to the things we truly love & need. (Or at least we should try to, I suppose.)

   Outside of the fun of simply skating, which can briefly be described as 'the thrill and the agony' & 'adrenaline is a helluva drug'; it’s awesome how it allows you to tap into personal aesthetic & creativity in a number of ways. So in addition to having a blast shreddin' the streets and learning new tricks, I’ve re-discovered my favorite way to express my energy; whether it be via what threads I wear out to skate, where I skate, the types of vids & photos I shoot while out skating, the music I skate to, the decks/setups I choose, or way I ride through the city. Even the basics, fails, bails, and occasionally eating shit can be fun and make for good times and footage… It's my way to release the creative urge we all have inside us. Creativity can be expressed in many ways, and I do believe it's an intrinsic part of all humans and humanity itself. Athletics have been my main way to do so, and skating has always been my favorite, likely due to how individualistic it is. Everyone rides different, and you don't need anyone else to cooperate in your expression or even understand it.

   I also like to take casual pictures when the vision strikes, and I don't think I really developed this interest until I started riding everywhere by bike or board. You see a lot in the streets and inevitably wanna capture some of it. So skating gets me exercise, fresh air, and out into society to explore, experience, document, interact, participate and create...amongst many more benefits I'm sure I've left out for sake of brevity.

   I’ve always had a back and forth relationship with skating, despite an uninterrupted love for it. When I was younger, I was first limited by geography; not enough ideal places to skate and get in practice. The garage and street curb could only entertain me for so long. By the time I was a teen, I began to shy away from anything that seemed too “White”, as I was dealing with an identity/bi-racial crisis and wanted to lean more into my "Black side”. I cared more about my peers' perception than anything, as teens do, and enjoyed identifying with the rap/basketball crowd more than the others. I remained close friends with my skater buds, because we were friends before and after anything skating related. But at the time, skate culture was very white, kinda goth, a little punk, and a Jackass-era type thing that for sure would've had me placed in a teenage sub-group I had no interest in. So I chose to play hoops and chill in the hood with my Black friends, listening to rap and looking for girls. That was a good time in and of itself, and I learned a lot about myself and life during those years. So it was meant to be. But I did feel as though I was letting a part of myself down. The part that just wanted to skate, play video games, and watch Viva la Bam with my buds without worrying about outside judgement or labeling.

   This distancing remained as I made my way through college, and during my first few years living in NYC. But luckily I met a new best bud-to-become life brother, AK (pictured above), who got me back on the board! He was cruising around on his one day and I mentioned missing skating, so we went straight to Shut Skates in LES, and he helped me get a fresh set up. Having AK around not only got me over the initial hump of getting back in the game, he also helped me get over a lot my insecurities and anxiety when it came to riding around the city and feeling like a street skating noob. He apparently had zero anxiety about anything and I very much appreciated & glommed off that energy as much as I could.

   Without getting into an anxiety tangent, in short; I’ve always struggled with generalized anxiety and some sort of social anxiety as well. Never fear itself; just specifically the energetic stress that comes with constantly over-calculating and taking in the most minute details of day to day existence. My brain is always firing hot on all cylinders, and I have to continually practice cooling it down. As I’ve gotten older, developed an overall sense of self-security, accumulated enough life experience to generally get the gist of people & society, and maintain a discipline in the "art of no-mind"; I’ve been able to turn my anxiety down a bit. The alert mode never fully leaves, but I’m grateful it’s at least much more dim these days.

   Anyway, taking that into account, along with the normal ‘don’t die’ anxiety of riding around on tiny wheels right along with regular traffic throughout Manhattan, eating shit in front of strangers over & over again for months, before finally getting smooth with it; well, you can imagine the immense hurdle that was for me both mentally and physically. But thanks to my bud and my board, I got over that hurdle in due time and fell right back in love with skating. Except this time it was different, as I noticed the importance of loosening up, both figuratively and literally. I was grown and in a city full of freaks, where I could fully be myself and no longer had to attempt to fit in with any one group. I found my own niche, crew and style. I finally knew who "I" was and felt confident in it. I had something to do alone or with friends as I adjusted to becoming a New Yorker, and a security blanket of sorts in many settings. A literal vehicle to just go be myself wherever I felt like that day. You can use a skateboard for a lot of things in a crowded dirty city, and it’s an introverted Irish goodbye-practitioner’s best friend (I enjoy skating to and from events more so than actually being at any events themselves). There's no way I have the extensive & special relationship I do with this city if not for riding through all its streets for over a decade now.

   By spending a good amount of my 20s just skating around the city (most often with a pocket full of jazz cigarettes), I realized how little I actually need to be content. I've never been one for flash or to want much, but I began to appreciate the basics more than ever. Just hanging with friends, staying healthy and in shape, eating well after a good toke, enjoying good weather, enjoying bad weather, the beauty of nature, seasons, and walks outside, etc. I found myself, found there is no self. Nothing mattered in the best way possible. I was finally free to just be, with nothing to prove to anyone. Life wasn't easy all of a sudden, but it was no longer a serious matter. I found my favorite way to exist and enjoy the big city, as well as life itself. That fundamental mentality has continued, whether skating or not, and been more important than ever as I now approach 40.

   The world’s a tough place and NYC is nutso, so sure enough I still get sucked back into feeling the weight of it all on occasion. But then I remember to just get back on my board, back to the basics, whatever I love and enjoy for the sake of itself. That's all that matters. That’s what skateboarding has done for me, and what I hope your most loved hobby does for you. Neglect it and risk death by boredom.