An Elegy to Suck: My First and Last Trick

An Elegy to Suck: My First and Last Trick

Once when I was a lost 19-year old college kid doing a gap year while living in Korea, I joined a crew of skaters in Seoul. We traveled from Yongsan to Ttukseum to Cult. It was the only time in my life skateboarding that I found community by doing it. Those kids, probably 5 to 10 years younger than me, took it upon themselves to take me to their beloved spots. It didn’t matter what age we were. We all had our different styles. We all had our reasons for doing it. It was the summer of 2013 when I experienced discovery and adventure. At the end of summer, I moved to Woodhaven, Queens in New York City. At the local, the park was barren. In the streets, the terrain was tougher. The locals were hard to please. As I pushed around Eldert Lane in my lonesome, I ached for when I had a community. In a lot of ways, it was a sign of what was to come.

In the latter years, I struggled hard to recreate the joys of skateboarding. I don’t know if this was because I just stopped learning tricks or if I was too invested in what other people thought of me when I did it. But what I loved about it was how it was quite literally the vehicle that connected me to other people and places in the world. I always knew that I would quit skateboarding. But little did I know it would be because of a stupid falling out with someone or because I didn’t become professional. No, it was because of an injury.

Me and my older brother somewhere in Germany, 2002, courtesy of the Santos Family

First Trick

It was in 1999 when my brother and I entered the T&C Surf shop at the Pearl Ridge Mall. Being the little brother, I followed him with a great deal of attention. As he walked into the store, he had a swagger that reminded me of the rappers in those videos that him and my sister would record on MTV. I watched those tapes with a religiosity of a monk, and even at 6 years old, I couldn’t mimic my brother’s built-up style. He walked up to the glass display case where Shane, a Hapa blonde-headed worker stood, like a gatekeeper of a world beyond. “What’s up, Shane!” my brother said. He slouched over the glass displays, where all the trucks and wheels and stickers lay dormant. Legend had it was Shane was sponsored. He was known around Pearl City for his style and power, and he was well connected. All that Shane could offer was a head nod. As they began talking, I looked up at the wall behind Shane’s blonde head. On the wall were skateboard decks that lined every inch up to the ceiling, each with a colorful palette of image and texture and shine.

The only board that my father could afford to buy him was a blank Powell Peralta board. Its slick vanilla shine indicated that there was no graphic to destroy. No amount of board slides would alter its already blank slate. It wouldn’t be until Christmas when my father delivered the goods. Underneath the fake plastic mini Christmas tree that sat on copper plant stand, wrapped in red paper and images of Frasier Firs were a couple set of trucks (Destructo), Spitfire 53 mms, Bones REDS bearings, Black Magic Grip tip, and nuts and bolts. It was Midnight, Noche Buena for Filipinos, when my brother’s wishes were granted. Once the morning sun hit, he would join his skater friends Russell and Kenneth from down the block. They would skate off to who-knows-where, far away from the confines of our little cul-de-sac in Aliamanu. I put down the boxing gloves I had gotten as a present, and I watched him piece together to skateboard.

I ended up inheriting his Nash skateboard. It was a hand-me-down from a neighborhood kid that sold it to my brother for $20 bucks. Back in those days, you could buy a lot with that. A bag of Hot Cheetos, a couple of bottles of Jones Soda, and an ice cream from the illegal vendors from a house a couple of streets away. The graphic is scratched up in the middle, and all I could make out was the image of a woman with claws. After ditching my rollerblades, ones I had bought after becoming obsessed with the roller-blading scene in The Might Morphin Power Rangers movie, I placed my left foot on the front of the board. As I pushed with my right foot, the board creaked. It got only a few inches forward. I pushed harder and doubled my distance. The board was a dud.

The first trick I learned was to roll down a set of stairs. Whether this was a trick can be contested, but as a young grom I made due with my dud of a board. A firecracker was a firecracker is a firecracker. Gravity was the only way to make for the wheels to spin. So as I exited my home on Acacia Place, I threw down my board immediately as the path that led to the stairs cemented my destiny. It was 3 flights of stairs that connected the path that went up to my front door to the sidewalk that plateaued. Beyond the sidewalk led one to exit Acacia Place. Knowing how slow the board was, I took my running start from the door itself. I pushed 3 times and jumped off the board before committing to the edge of the top stair. I couldn’t see below, and it felt like I was leaping off a waterfall in Manoa.

Again, I started from the house door, pushed 3 times, and I jumped off. I was afraid, but I was determined to get to the sidewalk. One more try, I thought. From the door, I felt the cracks of the walkway energize my pushing foot. Right before the top step, I stomped both of my feet on top of the ragged grip, and then I rolled down the three stairs. As I landed on the sidewalk, I kept pushing. I was on the street. The gravel beneath felt different. Before I knew it, I had reached the end of Acacia Place. When I looked back, it felt like I was a lot farther from home.

Last Trick

As I exhaled, out came the deep feeling of embarrassment – one that I knew would return the moment I set foot at the park. It was 2022, and I had not skated since I had returned to New York City.

At Astoria Park, there were kids that I had started skating with. I had gotten into the routine of showing up at a specific time, not because I wanted to, but because I had gotten familiar with the pattern in which certain people showed up. I was the early bird. My story was that I worked at a school during my weekdays, so it was natural for me to show up before all the other locals made it out. I pretended that this is how the natural course of the session turned out, but I freaked out anytime someone that looked familiar came through. The real reason I was at the park early in the morning was that I was not a great skater. I was unskilled. I had only a number of tricks up my sleeve. With no one around at 6 AM, I could fuck up something as simple as an ollie or frontside 50-50. In this case, the only style that mattered was showing up ridiculously early so as to not have to perform my nonexistent bag of tricks.

But as soon as morning expired and the afternoon rolled in, with the sun beginning to be beaming down, that’s when I started to get a little too in my head. That’s when I would begin focusing on another skater, offer my “What’s up?,” and completely feel engulfed in shyness when their response was silence. There was one particular skater I watched as he traversed the course, hitting each bank and corner with a sixth sense. He had style. He was smooth. He was the one I had to get on my good side. What better way to do this? Skate harder.

I snaked through the flow of the park, and I hit my usual routine. I rocked to fakie revert back to regular on the left quarterpipe. Then I nollied to catapult me onto the even ground. Although Astoria Park had a natural incline that matched the roving hills toward East River, I faked my style and made my back right leg bend to my will. I made a U-turn and turned back around and pushed harder to hit the right quarterpipe. I approached it backside and slashed my trucks on the sloped corner, a type of crunching sound that fed a deep thirst in the stoke of my soul. Cruising along the flow of the park, I went toward the middle of a flat bar and hippie jumped it. A trick – something for the kids. Beaming, I curved to my right and pushed. I approached the manual pad and ollied up, balancing my two back wheels with the confidence of a loved and validated child. As I landed, I quickly coasted along the rest area. The skaters that sat on the ledges “Yew’ed,” and in my folly, I thought, “Let me make this interesting.”

I directed my board toward the stairs. It was a 3-set. It emptied out into a training area that had flatground for beginners. In a way, it was a scenic way to build the park. When you land at the bottom of the stairs, you see the rest of the park with all of its local inhabitants. Dog walkers. Lounging couples. Shirtless buff men walking off a hard workout. First, I did a sloppy kickflip that rocketed. I caught it clumsily, but even I knew this should have been a sign. Struggling to balance, I began pushing to shake off jitters. Never underestimate the confidence of a deep push. I planted my right leg three times into the ground, like a surfer digging for water. As I headed toward the three-stair set then I felt my weight become off balance. Close to the top of the set, my brain farted. Do I ollie or what? The 2-front wheels began to dip. The middle tapped the top stair. The back 2 wheels followed. I was rolling down the stairs. An accidental firecracker. But I felt that – in the process – my weight was shifting behind me. I started to fall backwards. So when my tailbone connected with the concrete ground at the bottom of the stairs, I blacked out.

Like most blackouts, I was either on my back for a few minutes or seconds. I couldn’t tell. Nor could I feel shit. On my back, I looked up at the RFK Bridge above. Once in the past, they had closed a specific part of the bridge for some unknown reason. During a session, I asked a city worker what had happened. “Nothing,” he said curtly. It turned out that pieces of the bridge were falling down. They were bold enough to do their job, punch in their numbers, and head home after a long day. But they’d give a shit about injured skaters.

Suddenly, I felt the sensation of shock. The jolt travelled deep from my numb toes along my slightly sore back and up to my brain. My tailbone began to pulse in shocking waves of treacherous thumping. I wanted to cry, but I was too embarrassed. I’d never seen a skater cry in a video or in a session. Maybe yell or get mad at passersby. But what use was it if I sucked. What made this situation even worse was what happened when I looked up to the top of the set. I had seen for a brief moment the guy that I was trying to impress. In his faded black hat, he skated by and laughed. The jig was up. I was never good to begin with. In one afternoon, I had managed to do both my first and last trick.

Outro

These days when I talk to my brother about why he had quit skateboarding, he tells me it was when he had finally landed a hardflip. This was during the days when he skated with Shane and his crew. “It was the hardest trick I had wanted to learn, and when I landed it, I was done,” he said. Since I had quit, the pain of my injury remained, even after months of rest. The icebaths didn’t help. The meditation brought visions of terror of the time I lost all sensation in my legs for a few minutes. Since then, I had been scared to go back to the park. I was worried that I would injure myself even more. Concerned about having to be that one kid at the local who fell on their ass. There was one time I had tried to push down the street just to see what it would feel like. As the wheels crunched with the sharp gravel road, I shoved down my pride and turned around. I turned right back around and went home. That’s when I knew it was over for me.

So it was in 2023 when I started to take down the boards on my wall. The Baker Freddie Krueger Spanky model. The Ryan Lay Sci-Fi Fantasy Horses deck. The Gilbert Crockett Blue Dog joint. In my apartment in Queens, I now had resigned to watching old videos of footage from kids in the city. Ten years ago, the city looked a lot clearer. Those Lurk Videos made it possible to feel as if you could navigate a sidewalk on wheels without having to yell at people and looking like a complete dick. I don’t skate anymore, but I still watch skate parts with the religiosity of a monk. But at my age, there’s no way I can step on the board without thinking about that injury. No longer are my walls filled with reminders of the adventures I’ve had in Korea or Italy or Alaska, pushing down hills toward nowhere. They remain blank, as I wonder what more could I do than struggling to let go of the one thing I had loved for the last 25 years of my life.