Sometimes people listen to me...

While standing on a plank of wood measuring 48"x10" and blasting down a hill at speeds approaching 35mph weird stuff goes through your mind. "Will my wheels hold the next carve?" "My toe-side is way more stable than my heel-side" "What the fuck am I doing? I dont even have insurance...."

Fitness has long been an enemy of my personal state. Though when I was much younger and much more spry I used to participate in several varieties of vigorous physical activities. There was baseball, football, tennis, biking, skateboarding, and a few other oddballs. I was almost good enough at sports to work my way into the seedy underbelly of high school hierarchy known to most as "the Jocks". I played varsity football my sophomore year and varsity baseball all 4 years of my high school career. At that point in my life I was a regular Bo Jackson. Right after high school something changed and I stopped almost all sporting activities. Maybe it was because I discovered smoking, drugs, alcohol abuse, and spousal abuse. Maybe it was because my time became occupied with failing out of my first semester at college while simultaneously mastering Tony Hawk Pro Skater 4 on my friends Gamecube console. Who knows. It would be almost impossible to accurately pin-point the cause of my physical downslide. The point is, I lost it.

Every man and woman on the planet at some point in their life will interact with a child or adolescent. And eventually there comes a time when during one of those interactions, every man and woman on the planet will say to one or more young budding child, "Embrace your childhood! I wish I could be young, vibrant, and carefree again." Everybody wants to be a kid again. People will do anything to get the feeling of youth back. They'll spend tons of money to obtain something from their childhood such as an original Buck Rodgers ray gun in C10 condition. They'll scour through phone books and spend hours searching facebook for their childhood pals. We all do the same thing. For me embracing my childhood coincides with regaining my physical prowess. Recently, I embarked on my first attempt to lasso my youth which was let out to pasture so long ago.

I found myself shuffling around a hardwood floor which created a dissonant fugue of groans and squeaks as I moved from plank to plank. The tired and worn floor was that of Fairman's Skate Shop located on Gay St. in the heart of historic West Chester, PA. I was there to purchase a time machine. A device that could send me on a trip back to when I was a few inches shorter and several years younger. I carefully examined the time travel devices which were lined up against the wall like small orphans putting on their best to get adopted. After finally making a choice, the shopkeep rang me out and I was on my way. Now I had my time machine, my longboard.

While standing on a plank of wood measuring 48"x10" and blasting down a hill at speeds approaching 35mph weird stuff goes through your mind. "Will my wheels hold the next carve?" "My toe-side is way more stable than my heel-side" "What the fuck am I doing? I dont even have insurance...." Having the time of my life is what Im doing. I finally found a way to regain what I lost with age. Exuberance, life, meaning. It all comes rushing back while bombing down a hill. Usually thats the exact moment when you catch a ditch, jam on a rock, or mis-step a foot brake and quickly get snapped back to reality as your extraneous appendages slam into the ground and grind asphalt into your pores. But hey, what would you do as a kid in that situation? Get up, rub some dirt on it, and do it again. Thats the beauty of youth. We think it never ends.

I highly suggest everybody take a moment and grab something from your childhood. Its fun and exciting. If the only childhood memory you can wrangle up happens to be the time you put your hand on the stovetop because its warm glow seemed so inviting, please be sure to wear oven mits this time. I dont want to be liable for any injuries....