Skateboarding

Part 1: Not skateboarding

I've been wanting to skateboard for many years. Always too scared. I was a big ol' fan of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater, since the first game came out, but that never really translated into an interest of skateboarding in the real world. I remember standing on a skateboard at Toys "R" Us when I was like ten but immediately didn't like it. Was scared of it. Also I think my parents discouraged it anyway. My brother was a skateboarder at the time and he'd occasionally come home all bloodied n shit, they didn't like that.

An interest started to appear in adulthood though. In the late 10s I started to think "hmm skateboarding might be cool." It was also accompanied by thoughts of being too old for it and not being athletic and of course, still scared of getting hurt. I have a low pain tolerance!!

There was a run of SpongeBob Santa Cruz skateboards in 2019 or 2020 which really inspired me to get one, but they sold out. And then I didn't have the money for one, and then I forgot. Then in 2022 a skateshop opened up nearby, made me go "oh yeah! I wanna do this!" My sweeite and I went into the shop and talked to the owner for a bit, I asked about prices and he showed me some stuff. The store was this man's passion project, he constructed all the displays himself, did the graphic design himself, was starting to make decks from scratch, it was really cool! It was in the fall, so I was getting ready to retreat into the warmth of my home for the winter, and I didn't have skateboard money. "I'll be back when I have the money saved and it's warmer," I said. Lots of bad life stuff got in the way, I never got the money set aside, I ended up putting it on the backburner.

Part 2: Not skateboarding yet, but getting ready

Maybe the biggest thing that kicked me into skateboarding was my age. In 2025 I turned 34. Feelings of ~life passing by~ are cropping up, so many things I've wanted to do that I haven't been doing, etc. etc. Also, 34 is the age that my body started to feel like it's getting older. Now, the more I put it off, the harder it's going to be. Plus, hey I should be doing some physical activity! I had some money saved from xmas, I had the desire and interest, I was ready to get going! I was going to go to the local skateshop I mentioned earlier and buy whatever, but oh boy, it had shut down less than a year prior. I feel bad! I missed my chance to support them. Not that my one purchase would have saved the business, but. I dunno. I wish I could have been part of it.

Since I didn't have a shop down the street from me to support anymore, I went on a online search for a board I really liked. I searched manufacturer's websites, I searched the inventory of shops in Flint, Ann Arbor, Detroit, etc., I wanted to find something perfect for me. If you know me, you know this leads to paralyzing indecisiveness. I spent my time looking at boards and watching skate videos to hype myself up. I settled on going to Olympia Skateshop in Ann Arbor, they had a small selection of boards from the brand Quasi, a brand that has some weird stuff that I really enjoy.

I picked out my board, a cute lil thing that's yellow and expresses social anxiety and overstimulation and I'm like, that's perfect! They started to assemble the whole thing and I'm like "hey wait, i wanna do it!" and they were like, oh cool good, here you go. Anyway, here's some photos. Me walkin down the street after buying all my stuff, me showing off the design on the board, and my board and all the hardware all ready for assembly!

Part 3: Okay now I'm skateboarding

I'm losing my steam writing about this!! I spent a buncha time watching videos on how to start skating, how to push how to blah blah blah, so I found a few times to go to the skate park and try and get used to being on a board! It was really hard! I've had a few little milestones, such as: Can push and go in a straight line! Push and get my back foot on the board! That's mostly what I got going on. I find moving my front foot to position after getting my back foot on the board to be really intimidating. That's what I'm working on now, and I'm getting more comfortable with it. Another thing that's intimidating is cracks in the cement! There's a few big ones at the skate park, and if you're not going fast enough they'll stop you dead. And some are big enough that I get scared and hop off before I get to em.

I was only able to get to the skate park a few times before I got really busy with a play I was working on. By the time I had the time, it was too cold out and I had to stop for the season. I just recently got back to it, I spent one day getting back on the board and getting comfortable with pushing and getting both feet on the board again. I spent the next day doing the same but also trying other stuff. Tried practicing tiny lil kickturns, that was going well until I fell :( my first fall! It wasn't fun! It kinda hurt! I got protective gear though, of course. Wrist guards saved me there. So I got up and tried pushing again, and I think my body wasn't up to it yet because I very quickly fell again, this time the board shot forward a bit so my leggies got all stretched out and that wasn't fun, and today my legs are all sore! It was really nothing bad, I'm just not used to falling and it really startled my body, I felt uneasy and unstable the rest of the time at the park. So I learned that I need to learn to stretch before skating, I need to learn how to fall safely, and I really need to get back into yoga.

I decided that I can't do this very well on my own, I need guidance, a second pair of eyes, I need help. I'm gonna try and schedule a time in a week to work with someone. Hopefully I start progressing faster! Cuz also, a big question of mine is "what do I do next?" I tend to get stuck doing the basic things and wanting to perfect them, it's hard to know where to go from here. ahh!!

Part 4: The video component

One thing about skateboarding that really interests me is the video part. Skate vids! DIY movies! Love it! I love video editing and multimedia and computers so here's a way I can play with that stuff and tie in the two interests! I've taken videos every day I've been out skating (it's a lot of nothing! Me talking and me moving around with the board like an idiot, nothing interesting!) with the intention of documenting my progress, and hopefully making something fun to watch from it. I also have four angles of me building my board, that's pretty fun! Gotta edit that half hour down to a minute.

The problem is I haven't had the drive to edit anything! Because there's not much good stuff! Oh well, I do hope that is something I can get going!!!! Because that's cool to me!!!! At the very least, when I learn some tricks and can do stuff that looks cool, that will be a lot easier to get into a fun video. Patience!