where you at Slakjack?

Where have you gone SlakJack?
The Old Man Army needs you back,
Have you seen him? Where has he gone?
Is he skiing in Montana from dust until dawn?
Maybe he snuck down to Arizona in the middle of the night,
Saw all the fun that Hughes and company had and booked a flight.
Jamming with Dreadlox, getting schooled by Oldguytom,
Looking for Orezona (he’s a brand-new daddy, now’s dat’s the bomb—),
Paying his respects to OldMans Brian and Mike,
Seeing firsthand what D.I.Y. and dedication is like.
Roasting under the burning skies, rad stylings done sky high,
Kicking it with skinner, oldsk8r and anyone else that happens by,
Like Crash and Billy, tekno, luckybastard and Westsidematt,
Jlcopr5150, airsick, frogzila, pinky and the rest of you AZ cats.
Or perhaps he took that long-awaited trip to Fiji,
Can’t be sure, maybe we should consult the Ouiji,
Either way, either or, the boards just aren’t the same,
Minus Slakjack, the skate/ski/bike-master addicted to pain.
Maybe he made it to Shanghai or hooked up with Jonno,
Down in Thailand or Indonesia or Singpore, I just dunno.
Perchance he’s in Britain, chatting with Gazza,
Drinking brews and listening to Ofra Haza.
PM Trevenen and Alec, ask them if he’s visiting,
Over in Surrey or Cornwall, shopping for bling,
Shredding with Aa-shi and Chili down by the sea,
Or over in Sussex with Jellyhead, where else could he be?
SteveS, Woody, Dobbo, Wayne-ur, Sam, Joolz
Munchh with the sexy tube socks, theHobbit too,
Go about your business as you normally do,
But report back to OMA if you spot this kook.
I have no idea where he might have gone,
Sorry noeyedear, nearly left you out of my song,
Pass my query along to southcoastshredder,
The more the merrier, the more the better,
Ask TonyB and the rest of London’s tube-way clique,
Or ChrisK, vilms, southbankboy, BDP all demboyz is just sick.
Or he might have fallen in with that OZ crew,
Kicking it with Bill or Wafflesole, drinking some brews,
Living life not merely planning, delaying,
Out there doing what he wants, out there playing.
Boomerdog, insaneTFO, and the rest of the Aussie crew,
Hide your wives, your children, and your dingos too,
If Slackjack’s in your hood, please be extra aware,
Homeboy’s plain crazy, but that’s precisely why we care.
He represents the child in all of us, free-spirited and unedited,
He says what we’re thinking, and we’re all much indebted,
To the wild man child from down Idaho way,
Living his life not for tomorrow, but for today,
Homeboy started skating at the age of thirty-nine,
Is now ripping Hailey, barefoot, alla the time.
Maybe he hitch-hiked to Louisville and is skating,
Hooked up with the Concretins, busy creating,
Skating the full pipe or that giant half, it’s hard to say,
Either way, either or, enjoying life, living for today.
SlakJack, did you move back to Cali,
Get yourself a new girl, named Betty, June or Sally,
Skating with Tioem, ERIC31, antix818, or MadSpaniard,
Timnator, DaveB7, flapping your arms, just like a bird?
Or are you still in the Pacific Northwest,
Depends who you ask, but they claim their crete is the best,
Are you visiting with Fleabagmatt, Boisetom or cskate
(By the way, his website, OldSchoolSkaters is just great),
Oregonparkskater, swervo, Ping! and Hughes are all here,
But then again, you’ve probably skated with them guys for years.
There’s a whole big Canadian crew brewing,
Trying to do the same thing that you’ve been doing,
Have you met Topgun, TorontoSK8 or boomboom,
If not, you need to get back on the board real soon.
Do you remember some cat named skategeezer,
He puts out Concrete Wave mag, a real crowd-pleaser,
But you’re probably up at Whistler with wavesowner snowboarding,
Or in Stockholm, Sweden with that oldschooler, H, fjord-ing,
Don’t know what that means, I just made it up.
Maybe you’re in Texas hanging with SA_ditch and jduck.
Stop in and say hi to Stalag 5, he’s over there as well,
Better go and check on O’johnny, weather’s been giving him hell,
I know I’m forgetting someone and I apologize,
Ratnut, bhop73, bknockazz, tempie, didn’t mean to forget you guys,
Bondiboy66, Dr.Doom, discipleofsketch, should also be recognized,
Along with braman, DomitianX, shoester--really too many to list,
So if I left you out, (like Chef for instance) please don’t get pist.
Don’t forget those Colorado boys under 4 feet of snow,
MileHighSkates and PMiller, for those who don’t know,
Maybe Slak’s skating that crazy/sick Totem Bowl,
owned/built/skated by some dude named freakbro.
Could be Slak’s visiting El Gato Negro in France,
hope someone warned him that homie don’t wear no underpants,
Likes to fly his boys free, blowing in the breeze,
Flapping in the wind, clean shaven as can be.
You east coasters be on the look out,
If you come across Slak, give a shout,
Jessup, OldBoardBum, Jer and theMutt,
Help out an old homie and get him out of his rut,
Show him your pools, your ramps and your secret spots,
Take him to your ditches, your minis, even to parking lots.
BigOldScab, Scon, Midlo, ghop77 and my boy Wormy13,
Show the Slackster what skateboarding really means,
To those far from the sun and glamour of the left coast,
And shamhammer from Brooklyn NYC never one to boast,
But he’s holding it down in the city that never ever sleeps
I think I got everyone, I think I named alla my peeps.
For those of you living in Idaho, keep an eye out,
Let him know we wish him the best, leave no doubt,
And we hope to see his safe return to the board,
Though his spelling faltered, his words always soared.
I miss the Slakjack, this is true--but a note to the lama of llamas,
I mean that in the most non-gayest way, so nix the drama,
Just giving respect where respect is due,
I’m sure if you was gone, I’d miss you too.

mind wanders elsewhere

Snow floats down lazily from the gun-metal grey sky,
A freight train lumbers slowly by on my building’s north side,
Frozen slushy parking lot divides us from a row of evergreens,
I stare at the snow, the train, the trees--taking in the entire scene.
My mind wanders elsewhere, dreaming of the round wall,
Re-living backside kick turns as the snow continues to fall,
Dreaming of tail taps and axle grinds on the metal coping six feet high,
Meanwhile the day drags by, so slowly that it makes me want to cry.
I roll-in from the shallow end, dip into the deep end pumping,
Hit the far wall, riding the concrete wave, my heart jumping,
The board stalls on the vertical wall at six or seven feet,
I lean on the tail, turn the nose one-hundred eighty degrees.
I lean on the front and ride down the wall, pump as I hit the flat,
Riding and praying that I don’t eat concrete, and it’s over just like that,
So simple so smooth, I just stayed on, didn’t do anything else,
Gave up on flippy tricks, the youngsters can have those to themselves.
I started hitting the walls, carving and pumping as I go,
Trying to ride like a surfer, trying to catch my flow,
Rolling in on the smooth banks, hitting the pyramids,
Getting four feet up on the wall, enjoying skating with my kids.
Carving the corners, two wheels off the ground,
Feels faster than hell, as my momentum spins me around,
Kind of under control, but a hair’s breadth from losing it all,
Riding out of the corner, trying to stay on, trying not to fall.
A pool/vert newbie just trying to have some fun,
Freezing my butt off right now, wishing for the sun,
Dreaming of warmer days, when I can regain my stoke,
Living in the Northern Hemisphere, many of you are in the same boat.
Gonna grab the nose on my kick turn, progress to tail tap next,
Come spring, the kids and I will break out some new decks,
But the damn snow keeps falling down, starting to accumulate,
Little E and I will have to settle for fingerboards, which we appreciate.
Thanks to Wormy13 of Georgia for that unexpected gift,
Cold winter nights sans skating suck--really needed that lift,
So we’ll finger-skate the giant half-pipe, take turns with the Caballero,
Wormy sent us five popsicles and three O.G.’s that fly straight as an arrow.
Come this spring, we’ll be barging the local park,
Four deep, from early morning until after dark,
Until then we’ll just do what we can to stay sane,
Keep the dream alive and keep fanning the flames.

wish list

I have a short list of skateboard skills which I would like to acquire,
First off is dropping in with confidence at 6 feet and anything higher,
I just want to carve and learn a few lip tricks for good measure,
But my main goal is to be able to cruise around the park at my leisure.
I need to kickturn frontside, then grab the nose as I turn,
Maybe then tailtaps would be next for me to learn,
Then I would need to practice my fakie in the bowl,
And practice pumping even though it seems quite droll.
After all that--backside 5-0’s or crail slides are next,
I crave axle grinds almost as much as I crave sex,
And rock n’rolls of course, are also on my short list,
Backside/frontside on all these tricks and any that I might have missed.
To some these might seem simple and kind of plain,
But I feel like I’ve made great strides since I started skating again,
Props to Old Man Army for re-igniting the flame,
And supporting me and allowing me to get back into the game.

llama khamma (karma)

(with an assist from BillfromOz)

just last week i traveled to the dhammasala,
on the way i noticed a half dozen or so llamas,
quite an odd sight in the middle of nowhere,
grazing and eating, the wind blowing their shaggy hair.
I went to seek knowledge from Ajahn,
a Thai version of a Tibetan lama,
talked about such things as khamma (karma),
whether or not he believed in nibhanna (nirvana).
These are words you might recognize,
Sanskrit is similar, but not used by Thais,
Thai monks speak and read the older Pali,
Pali evolved into Sanskrit, like ollies begat nollies.
I was talking to a future reluctant monk,
it turns out that he was an ex-skate punk,
also turns out he's still got his old set-up,
is giving it my son, will leave it in the meditation hut.
So the next time you are out and about,
if you spy some llamas, free yourself of doubt,
these magical creatures apparently bring good luck,
cause with llama khamma (karma) nothing will suck.

bill danforth interview

In other skateboard related news, Bill Danforth agreed to do an interview for the OldManArmy—I will get the credit and the membership has been asked to come up with questions for Bill. There is a possibility that the interview will be used in OMA’s upcoming skatezine (the second one they have done), so it will be cool to see my handle, if not my byline, in print. I will post a copy of the interview once it’s completed.
This is the intro I did for OMA—it’s pretty rough and real sketchy on the facts, but I just needed something to get the ball rolling on the interview:

Growing up in Detroit in the eighties, if you skated, you knew about Bill Danforth. Maybe you or one of your boys was lucky enough to skate with him--Danforth was all about the skating and sharing that stoke. His shaved head and aggressive skating helped him stand out from the crowd and my friends and I idolized the man.
Bill Danforth, the “American Nomad,” has been shredding his way around the world for the last twenty years. A Detroit native, his first pro deck came out in 1986 and he was a member of Alva’s infamous leather-clad skate team in the late eighties. He recently started his own company with Jay _-- American Nomad--and has Bill Tocco and Fred Smith (“the Loud One”) on as team riders.
He took part in Thrasher’s “King of the Road” in 2005, does skate clinics for local Michigan skateshops, and is still constantly on the road. His list of sponsors (former and current) is a who’s who of the skateboarding industry—Vans, Madrid, Alva, etc . . .
He’s lived the dream, skating just about everywhere and with just about everyone. At forty, Bill is still ripping and representing. He is taking part in the All Nations Skate Jam in Albuquerque in April and did a cover/interview for Concrete Wave last year.
Some of the younger skaters have taken to calling him “Old Man Danforth,” so let’s give him the OLD MAN ARMY treatment . . .

All Nations Skate Jam

My buddy Todd (owner of TwoEaglesArt, Ollie’s skate shop, and Native Skates) is putting together a skateboard “demo” in Albuquerque, New Mexico on April 29. The idea behind it was to highlight the plethora of skateboard talent in Indian Country. The event will take place the day after The Gathering of Nations Pow Wow, which bills itself as “the world’s largest pow wow.”
Todd has several co-sponsors for the event—American Nomad, Wound Knee Skateboards and Apache Skateboards.
American Nomad is co-owned and operated by skateboard legend Bill Danforth and Wound Knee is Jim Murphy’s company. Both those guys skated with Tony Alva’s legendary skate team in the late 80’s. Murph is also Lakota, from what I have been told. Concrete Wave magazine has agreed to do an article on the event and Bill and Todd met with legendary skateboard photographer, MOFO, in Albuquerque yesterday.
I am hoping to go make the trip down to Albuquerque in April for the skate jam, but I am going to have to rely on a ride from someone. It’ll be cool to check out the action—meet other Native skaters, Native celebrities and Native musicians as well. Of course, being able to skate the park and the famous Albuquerque ditches would be icing on the cake. In addition, I have wanted to meet Michael Brooke, publisher of Concrete Wave. He did a book on original Dog Town skater Jay Adams last year and has published several skate-related books as well, including Concrete Wave.
Meeting MOFO would be cool as well—he was Thrasher’s main photography during their golden period in the eighties . . .

simple misdemeanors

i been in the can plenty times,
can't so i enjoyed it,
but i had to pay for my crimes,
simple misdemeanors, nothing big,
i was young and stupid, just a kid,
waking up more drunk than hung over,
on a slab of steel, lights on full tilt,
officers glaring at you behind plexiglass,
coulda been worse, woulda been worse,
in Detroit at night its lights out,
got you in a cell with 20 other mugs,
they ignore the yells and screams,
figure you get what you deserve,
lucky for me i was a college kid,
in a college town, full o knuckleheads,
knew real soon, knew real quick,
didn't wanna do it again any time soon,
kept saying it was gonna be the last time,
last time turned into third time,
finally drew the line, found my voice,
cut my ties, made my choice,
walked away from all that came before,
just wanted to live, to make it to 24,
changed my life, never looked back,
one foot on the wagon, now that's a fact,
need to go clean, need to decide,
playing with alcohol, gonna rot my insides
living a life of delusion, foggy minded,
thought I was the shiite, so blinded,
not what i wanted at all, not at the start,
gonna start fresh, live from my heart,
too many lost friends, many wasted days,
need to get myself straight, lift the haze,
living life like walking on the razor's edge,
no more screwups, that I do pledge,
gonna get clean for me and the kids,
don't want them doing the things that I did.

tech deck

The 4-year-old and I are newly addicted to fingerboards.
He’s had Tech Deck “Dudes” in the past, but it never seemed to take hold and he would lose the riders and/or boards after a few days. He’s pretty spoiled and always manages to drag one of us to the toy section to buy him something or other. I was looking at the Tech Deck stuff they had in stock at our local big box retailer during my recent knee injury. Fingerboards by themselves seemed kind of boring, but they had these skatepark sets—the one in particular was a “Corner Bowl.” Blind, World Industries, Tony Hawk, Girl Skateboards, et al., have sets that you can put together and make your own huge finger board skatepark. You would need to buy two or four of the sets to make a proper bowl, but I just found it really intriguing nevertheless.
So the other day E and I were at the big box retailer, yet again, and instead of buying him his usual Superman/Spiderman/Spongebob/whatever action figure, I talked him into getting a skatepark set. I ended up going to four different stores before I found one—in the last week all the sets have disappeared from the shelves. I bought the very last one at Meijer’s—it wasn’t even a corner bowl, it was a quarter pipe/grind rail combo. By that point I was desperate.
The sets only cost about $10 and the boards by themselves are about $3. The Tech dudes are in the same range as the boards and they come on a plastic magnetized board. The fingerboards are more “realistic” and have plastic trucks and wheels on a little board with a grip-tape top. There are cool graphics on the bottom of the decks as well.
I found a few e-bay listings, a few of them expired--the Tony Hawk complete set was for sale and some other guy was selling a “250 piece” set. Prices were all over the place, as is common on e-bay, so I didn’t get a good sense of what demand is like. The corner bowl was selling for $7.50 and $40. Two different sellers, two totally different prices.
I’m left with a few questions at this point—do the “Tech Dudes” work on the ramps as well—I don’t see why not, but just wanted to be sure. The other thing is—where did all the sets go? Are they discontinued or did they just happen to run out of them?
E won’t leave the house without his fingerboard and skatepark set—he takes it everywhere with him. I have to wait my turn to play with the fingerboard, which doesn’t sit too well with me. I’m also dying to get my hands on a couple of the bowl sets, but in the meantime, I’m using a big wooden salad bowl that I swiped out of the kitchen. I was hoping to get my little E skating in the spring and hopefully the fingerboard helps stoke his interest. Until my knee is fully healed, I’ll have to satisfy my skate jones with some fingerboard action as well.

knee gasket

I messed up my knee skateboarding about a week and a half ago-- I finally started "dropping in" to the concrete half pipe--my foot slipped off and I twisted it pretty good. I'm still hobbling around and still wearing a knee brace--need to go see a specialist and make sure I didn't do any major damage.
A co-worker took this picture--I'm not quite that pudgy, really-- the camera added 10-15 lbs. at least. In real life I only weigh 185 lbs. (give or take) . . . I did go over 190 for the first time ever recently, but I was starting to work out again, until I hurt me knee, but other than the Beer-Lao belly, I'm a solid 185 lbs. Really.
Convinced? Neither am I.

little thunderbolt

E stumbles out of bed, hair mussed half-asleep,
Bee-lines to the toilet, yawning as he goes,
Wearing only his miknoot, his SpongeBob underwear,
He wanders into the living room to watch T.V.
The boy rules his roost like no one else,
Has his parents and siblings at his beck and call,
Comes and goes, getting into everything,
Might be an issue if he weren’t so cute.
Yesterday he tore up all my cigarettes,
Announced to me that I could no longer smoke,
I was more upset about the mess he made,
Couldn’t argue with his logic.
He argues and orders a bit too much,
But he’s at his most dangerous when he’s nice,
Turns on the charm and he gets whatever he wants,
Gives you that disarming smile and all is forgiven.
He was the physical manifestation of concern,
Upon hearing that I was injured,
“Daddy, you have boo-boo leg?”
followed by “Daddy needs a chair with wheels.”
The latter more out of frustration,
Because I can’t jump around and wrestle,
Do any of the million and one things,
That he wants me to do for and with him.
He cracks us up when he tries to dance,
Looks like Snoopy having a seizure,
But he dances with joy and abandon,
Living fully in the here and now.
Four-year-old has everything figured out,
Hanging out at the temple, playing with the dog,
He asks everyone where they’re going,
Said, “Hey, where’s the sticky rice?!”
Ajahn tells me the Thai kids are much the same,
They make themselves right at home,
The Buddhist temple is a place to play,
Twenty-seven acres of fields and trees.
I remind him that the monks do ceremonies,
He looks at them, with anticipation,
Waiting for them to do, not just be,
“They not do ceremony, they just chililn.”
He uses our slang, uses Odawa and Lao,
All mixed together, all mixed up,
In some kind of east coast accent,
Not sure if it’s Brooklyn or Bronx.
He talks about “Noo Yawk” quite a bit,
For someone so young, who was only there once,
Nearly two years ago, and he always points it out,
When he sees buildings or bridges in movies or T.V.
“Little E” we called him, not so little anymore,
his pediatrician thought it was “Little Italy”,
But his name is Odawa, means “Thunderbolt,”
Or “Thunder Clap” and an apt name it is.