Photo by Aleksandr Neplokhov from Pexels

Well, I managed to get myself back to the skatepark this evening, but I can’t say it was quite as successful as my first time around. I had a decent time rolling around and managed to land a few tricks, but a few painful shots to the shin took the energy and enthusiasm right out of me. On top of that, a lot of the young skaters ripping around the park were absolutely killing it (they were really, really good). It made me feel old, and out of the loop with skateboarding in general.

There’s a peculiar psychological phenomenon that takes place when you skate in a park you’re unfamiliar with. You might roll into the park feeling confident and comfortable on the board, maybe even land a couple tricks on your first roll-around. But after witnessing some better skaters land some insane tricks, all you want to do is stay out of their way so you don’t end up embarrassing yourself. The odd time you fall hard on your hip doesn’t help, either.

Seeing how skilled these young skaters were today made me think of how far skateboarding has come even since I was in high school, both in terms of technical tricks but also huge, dangerous, gnarly handrails and gaps.

To give some idea of what I mean, here’s professional skateboarder Mason Silva defying death while destroying the streets of San Francisco.