hesh vs fresh

Sunday, October 24, 2010

one day

one day i will stop being a p***y and skate this bump to bar across from the shop.... i heard through bogdan that casey rigney already did it...

--matt

about five years ago, i happened to be skating down flatbush ave at the intersection where the new shop coincidentally is now located, and some random older dude had walked out of the hardware store (pintchik) and started talking to me. Typical new york i thought. Just some rando weirdo so i kind of tried to brush him off. Fail. He kept talking and then i remember he said to me, verbatim " you probably think im just some old dude, but i used skate with andy kessler in the 70's!" i remember that was the point where he basically established some credibility with me and we talked and he got on my board and pushed around and did some really outdated skating but it was so rad that stoke he got from seeing me just charging down a busy street and he felt obliged to kind of befriend me and thats whats so rad about skating. Even transcending generations (in this example). Its like a weird cult, or brotherhood, or something. Anyway, the point of this story is that our counter is positioned in such a way at the store, that i spend the day viewing that corner, and consequently replaying that incident in my head. NYC skateboarding would not have progressed like it did without kess. respect.

-- Matt Gilbert

pretty much the best photo of skateboarding in general

R.I.P. Andy Kessler