Skater Punks, an essay by Kathy Fish

Skater Punks You know exactly what I am talking about. We have all seen them: the thrashed skate boards with nightmarish graphics, the bizarre array of boxers peeking out of the ridiculously baggy pants, jewelry protruding from places previously only inhabited by the stray hair trying to avoid being plucked, that's right, the skater punks. They aren't just boys or men; girls who played dress up and Barbie have thrown off the perception of pale pink and purple and are clad in black, brown, army green or any drab variation of the ominous colors Generation X has chosen for their coat of arms. Young men and women dress the same, walk the same, skate the same and sport the same flippantly arrogant attitude. What on earth would possess the youth of our nation to dress, behave and mutilate themselves in such a manner? Have you ever seen an X-Games skate board competition? These people are amazing. Why would you waste that athleticism and agility on a sport that has nothing to offer but a bad reputation, injury and trouble with the law?

"Mom, I'm home! Guess where Grandma took me to today. We found a skateboard at a garage sale and we bought it for $2.00 and we went to the skate park. It is so cool. I met some new friends and they showed me some tricks. Grandma is going to take me back next week," Conner, my then six year old, excitedly gushed as he walked through the front door.

Fear and anger seized me. I didn't know who to yell at first. Conner, seeing the fierce look in my eyes, yelled, "Grandma made me do it!" In her quest to become "cool," grandma had been turned to the "dark side." In Benedict Arnold style, facing battle and guaranteed desecration of her sainthood, she caved, switched allegiances, and sold me out for the price of a smile. I couldn't trust her, or the vipers she was now "hangin" with. Disbelief engulfed me like a dark, damp heavy cloud. My ally was gone, deserted; I stood alone to bear accusations like "you don't understand," "my friends who have cool parents get to skate," "you're closed minded and prejudiced," "just because you're old doesn't mean you know everything." The verbal battle was in full array and the arrows were hitting their target.

I pause from the narration at this time to relate an observation that has come as a morbid dose of reality for me. You will all have the following experience, at one time or another, it is unavoidable. You will supply grandchildren for your parents who have shamelessly begged, bribed, pleaded and blackmailed you to procreate. By giving in to their pleas you will have equipped them with the opportunity to earn their sainthood. Then, watching you stagger from a near fatal battle wound, they will step forward, take the sword from your child's hand and drive the final blow straight through your heart. With this one act they will forever endear themselves to your offspring and irrevocably reveal their true alliances— with them, against you.

'You know honey, you really should come check out the skate park before you make your final decision," a woman I did not know, who bore a striking resemblance to my mother, cooed logically. I spun around, a cornered, wild animal sensing the battle to ensue. "How dare you...We have talked endlessly about the problems with the youth of today, not the least of which is the 'skater-tude'... I entrusted my child to you and this is where you take him?...I don't care if he asked you to, be the adult,...show some back bone. You never had a problem saying the word 'no' when I was his age." My emotional diatribe was unashamedly being ignored. The traitor smiled, winked at Conner and said over her shoulder as she turned to leave: "Conner and I would be happy to let you tag along next time." I was speechless.

Defeated, weary from the staunch defense of ideals and perceptions my faculties began to call an all out retreat. "What could it hurt to go?...are you really afraid of some skater punks?...ratify your assumptions...prove your perceptions...isn't Conner worth your time...are you seriously going to let a 70-year-old grandma be more open-minded than you?" Finally with a sigh of surrender, "I'll go."

As I walked up the dirt trail to the "bowls" I tried to not look as scared as I felt. At first glance all I could see was concrete. There are two large "bowls" that are side by side and have a small lip that connects them. The "track" is the ring around the outer edge of the cement that incorporates two large ramps for building speed for jumps. In the middle there is a crisscross design with stairs and rails for "grinding." The design was ingenious, not much space but lots of options.

Conner threw his board down, put on his helmet, and off he rolled; around the track, up and down the ramps over and over, his smile spreading wider and wider across his innocent face. "Hi Conner," called a tall stereotypical skater. I bristled, started to step forward and the icy stiletto fingers from my childhood grabbed my arm. Without a word my mom rescued Conner from certain social death. "Hi Grandma, who's your friend?" the skater called out. Introductions were made and the grip on my perceptions began to erode.

Then my fears were realized, Conner took a nasty spill trying to grind. His board was too "sticky" to slide on the metal rail and he landed on his elbow and hip. To my surprise the skater punk got there before Conner's over protective mom. He gently picked him up, asked if he was okay, looked to make sure there was no blood, and walked him over to sit down.

"Next time borrow some of my wax to rub on the rail so it slides," came the helpful suggestion from the "punk." I was dumbfounded. Where were the "flippantly arrogant attitudes," disrespectful indifference, and the scorching defiant eyes? "He'll be okay, don't worry," the punk said reassuringly. "Thanks" I mumbled. "Mom, you said you rode a skateboard when you were young, try mine, its fun." "You rode a board? How cool, hop on and see if you remember how to roll" the skater kid smiled. "I wish my parents did something cool like that, then maybe they would understand. You are lucky Conner."

I didn't know whether to be embarrassed or proud. My tattle-tale conscience reminded me of those ten minutes earlier I was reciting the evils of skateboarding to myself. I cautiously placed Conner's board down and assumed the stance. The wheels rolled slowly at first, then faster and my confidence began to build. The adrenaline rush was instant. The faster I went the more intoxicated I felt. What a rush. I could do this all day.

"Mom, could I have my board now?""One more time around," I pleaded as I rolled quickly by."Come on mom, it's my board." I slowed down and jumped off. Conner took off and yelled "Hey mom, watch this."

Teachers come in all shapes, sizes and wear all kinds of different clothes. From eight to eighteen to seventy there are many different people from diverse walks of life that can show us things about who we are, who we think we are and most importantly who we want to become. I didn't change my choice of clothes, music or friends, but my custom board and pierced belly button have raised some eyebrows and given me the opportunity to do a little teaching of my own.

Original Source: realskate.com

Patriotic Duty - Sweet Land of Liberty

Childhood Obesity - Lets take a look at the toys.

There is no arguing that today's teens are in a poor state of health. A recent studies point the finger at the toys our kids play with. This year's hot Christmas toys include Next Gen video game systems, Halo 3, Skate, and a range of others games, Hand Helds, Cell phones, ringtones, Computers, Bratz and Star Wars toys, but not a single toy which encourages physical activity or outdoor play.

The survey notes that the most popular toys during the 1970s were mostly related to physical activity; however, the Toy Retail Association site shows that lego toys tended to be the most popular. During the 70's a number of hit toys, which encouraged outdoor play, were hugely popular such as the spacehopper, rollerskates, the Chopper bicycle, stunt kites, and skateboards. Now we are in the age of electronica. Technology is useful, helpful, and fun but it can also make us lazy and stressed.

Longboarding, transportation trend among adults

"Hey, Dad, can I borrow your skateboard tonight?"

If that's a sentence you have never heard, you probably haven't heard of longboard skateboards. Longboards are the hottest thing in skateboarding for adults. At the basic level, longboards are exactly that: longer skateboards, from 42 to even 80 inches in length, compared with regular boards that are 30 to 38 inches. The biggest difference is these sidewalk surfboards are designed for comfortable riding, not X Games-type tricks on the halfpipe or at the skate park.

"A general rule of thumb is 'the longer the board, the older the rider,' " says Ken Perkins of Arbor Snowboards and Skateboards, whose Hawaii-influenced designs are among the most popular sold.

"It's not unusual to see 40-year-olds commuting on them. During the recent New York transit strike, I saw some Wall Street types riding their boards to work."

Longboards are more stable and smoother riding because the board is more flexible and the wheels are made of softer plastic, allowing them to roll over pebbles and rough concrete that could cause a trick boarder to crash.

"About 85% of skateboarders leave the sport by the time they reach 18," says Michael Brooke, publisher and editor of Concrete Wave, a magazine dedicated to longboarding. "The high attrition rate is due to the true difficulty of doing the tricks. They're very technical and sometimes dangerous."

In 1998, a U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission study said 80% of the then-11.4 million U.S. skateboarders were under 18. Seven years later, a report by Transworld Skateboarding magazine said skaters 6 to 17 represented only half the nation's 16.4 million skateboarders. Hence the trend toward longboarding. It has become the No. 2-ranked skateboard activity in North America, according to a study by Label Networks, a Venice Beach, Calif., company that tracks youth culture trends. Street-style trick skating is first, and vert-park skating (half-pipe style tricks) is third.

"It is more utilitarian," Kathleen Gasperini, senior vice president of Label Networks, says of longboarding. "You can use it as transportation or have your dog pull you around the neighborhood.

"Girls (whose participation levels in longboarding are 2% higher than boys) love it because it is easier than dropping into a vert ramp and a lot more fun."

Transforming trends

As with regular skateboards, longboards have their gnarly roots in surfing. In the early 1600s, Hawaiian surfriders used 18- to 25-foot mahogany and balsa boards. The modern 8- to 12-foot surfboard emerged in the 1930s. Today's highly maneuverable plastic-foam boards are as small as 6 feet in length. Skateboarding went through a similar but more accelerated metamorphosis. Skateboarding was created in the late 1950s by bored surfers looking for something to do until wave conditions improved. They bolted skate wheels to planks and cruised beach roads and sidewalks, sometimes setting up slalom courses in parking lots. In the 1960s, however, Tony Alva and his merry band of Dogtown surfer-skaters developed a skateboarding style that mimicked the swooping cutback moves of real surfing. Boards got smaller to accommodate their use in empty swimming pools. This evolved into halfpipe ramps and street-skate parks that emphasized riding on rails and ledges.

"That's when they threw the baby out with the bathwater," Brooke says.

Long days journey

Today's longboards are a return to those early days of road riding and slalom racing. Some longboarders are even going to extremes, in a laid-back, longboard sort of way. Adam Colton and two of his friends rode their longboards nearly 3,000 miles from Newport, Ore., to his home in Springfield, Va., last year. They skated more than 50 miles a day and had to tape their sneakers with thick layers of duct tape to keep them from disintegrating.

"The key to the whole trip was switching legs to push off, otherwise I would have had one huge leg," Colton says.

Colton, 22, and associate Adam Stokowski, 21, also from Springfield, are taking longboards in a completely new direction by choreographing dance steps to be performed on them. They are also taping promotional videos for a line of longboards.

"I hurt my leg doing tricks," the lanky Stokowski says. "My parents are really happy that I'm able to make a living with longboards."

Parents aren't a visible component of trick skating, but Gasperini says longboards are giving the sport a cross-generational boost. "In longboarding, you now have parents who used to do vert riding skating with their young kids," she says. "This is the first time that has happened."

Original Source: USAToday

Exercise and Fitness for Kids

Although poor eating habits get a lot of the blame for the rise in childhood obesity, another very big factor is that kids just aren't as active as they used to be. Unfortunately, the focus for many people on battling childhood obesity is only on improving nutrition, like making school lunches more nutritious and taking soda out of schools, but doesn't do enough to actually get kids more active. As with improving their child's eating habits, parents can have an important role in helping their kids more physically active. In addition to more physically active, unorganized free play, getting involved in youth sports, such as soccer, baseball, and gymnastics, etc., can be a good way to encourage kids to be active.

How Young Is Too Young For Sports?

Since most youth sports programs for young children are very noncompetitive and are just about getting kids to be active and learning some basic rules, even older toddlers and preschoolers can play some sports. In fact, many communities now have programs like Soccer Tots for toddlers who are 20 months and older. Depending on where you live, you might also find:

Gymnastics - gymnastics programs are available for kids at almost any age, even infants and toddlers, like at The Little Gym, and get more physically demanding as your child gets older.

Swimming - although the AAP doesn't recommend formal swimming lessons until children are 4 years old, an introduction to the water type Aquatics program is okay for toddlers if they are well supervised.

Flag Football - typically age 4 and above.

T-ball - typically age 4 to 7.

Soccer - the YMCA has a Small Fry Soccer program for preschoolers over age 3.

Your local YMCA and their Youth Super Sports program is a good place to look for noncompetitive sports for younger kids. You might also find a youth sports program through your city, a private association, or a larger church in your area. Keep in mind that youth sports that are run by private associations tend to be more competitive than the YMCA, church groups, and most city leagues. Benefits of Starting Sports Early

Although some parents try to avoid youth sports until their kids are older, like 9 or 10 years old, because they want to avoid what they think is a competitive environment for their younger children, it is important to remember that most youth sports for younger kids are noncompetitive. Of course, you could have your 7 year old tryout for a tournament baseball team that travels from state to state with the goal of going to the Little League World Series or a football team that practices 4 days a week, and they would both likely be ultra-competitive. But you could just as easily join a team at the YMCA that doesn't have tryouts and doesn't keep score.

Some benefits of starting sports early, in addition to teaching responsibility, teamwork, and commitment, etc., include:

• Avoiding childhood obesity.


• Encouraging a healthy lifestyle and continued physical activity as they get older.


• Building motor skills.


• Making new friends.


• Less time to watch TV.

And if your child starts playing sports early, he or she can play a variety of sports, or all of them, and get a better idea of which one they like best.

Team Sports vs Individual Sports

In addition to differences in motor skills and how well they play sports, kids can have very different personalities and temperaments. Some are outgoing and competitive and love to play team sports, like soccer, basketball, and baseball, while others are overwhelmed with the idea of being on the field with a large group of kids. If your child isn't interested in team sports, that doesn't mean that he can't be active.

There are many individual sports that might be a better fit, including:

• skateboarding


• surfing


• swimming


• biking


• gymnastics


• wrestling


• tennis


• golf


• martial arts


• track and field


• dance

Keep in mind that some kids don't like team sports simply because they had a bad experience with one sport, team, or coach, and you might give another team or sport a chance or join a new team with a close friend so that he feels more comfortable.

Helping a Late Bloomer

Some children don't like sports because they just aren't as good as the other kids on the team. Especially for younger kids, there can be sharp differences in their abilities and developmental levels, but instead of giving up on sports, it can be a good idea to get your child some extra help so he can catch up. This can include gymnastics classes to improve general motor skills, enrolling in a skill and fitness program to help develop your child's athletic skills, extra practice at home, or getting some lessons in the specific sport you are playing.

Original Source: About.com, Vincent Iannelli, M.D.

Keeping the Family Fit

Getting fit is almost always at the top of adults’ to do list. But what about the kids? Too often couch-potato parents raise stroller-potato youngsters. With 10 percent of 2 to 5-year-olds and 16 percent of 6-to19-year-olds already overweight in the United States—and rising obesity rates in the rest of the world, experts say it’s crucial to get children moving early. Habits formed in childhood can often extend through adulthood. As New York pediatrician Jennifer Trachtenberg notes, “active kids do become active adults.” But that doesn't mean dragging your kids to the gym every day. “Any type of exercise is good, as long as it’s supervised, and parents are using common sense," says Keith Gorse, chair of the age-specific task force for the National Athletic Trainers’ Association.

Girls and boys just want to have fun. So let them. “Kids should play. They should move. They’re wired for these things naturally,” says pediatrician Peter Belamarich, associate professor of clinical pediatrics at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. Don’t forget to get down on the floor and play with your kids. Mike Monroe, a New York-certified strength and conditioning specialist who is lead trainer for an exercise program called PUSH, lets his 1-year-old son, Miles, crawl around him and on top of him. He also rolls a ball to Miles’s right side and then to his left. “People overanalyze what they think will help advance their kid,” says Monroe. Cedric Bryant, chief exercise physiologist for the American Council on Exercise, says he was like a “tree” for his four sons, now 10, 13, 15 and 17, when they were little, encouraging them to climb all over him. “One of the biggest mistakes parents make is to think it really has to be this really complex, packaged program and approach,” says Bryant. “The key is just to get your children to move. Just make sure it’s fun.” Don’t rush into organized sports. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends only 15 minutes of “structured activity” for preschoolers. After all, little kids’ attention spans are short, and they should be playing and exploring rather than doing formal calisthenics. The AAP statement also notes that participating in sports that aren’t age appropriate can cause problems: “When the demands of a sport exceed a child’s cognitive and physical development, the child may develop feelings of failure and frustration.” Enrolling them in ballet or gymnastics for tots is fine, with a caveat. “The key is not to take it too seriously,” says Dr. Angela Smith, an orthopedic surgeon at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia who is past president of the American College of Sports Medicine. Whether your child grows into a basketball superstar comes down to nature and nurture, says Small. “There’s genes and what you do with those genes.”

Turn off the television. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no TV for kids under 2, and no more than two hours of total screen time (TV, videogames, computers) for older children. Belamarich, a New York pediatrician, finds it sad when he asks kids to tell him about their hobbies and they say Playstation and XBox. “I’m seeing a bunch of kids pushing buttons hour after hour,” he says. Kids who watch more than 10 hours of TV each week are more likely to be overweight, aggressive and slow to learn in school, according to the American Medical Association. There are also concerns that kids who are “over stimulated” by TV and videos may be more prone to Attention Deficit Disorder. If your kids can’t resist the lure of the computer, have them engage in a “learning activity instead of a mindless activity,” says Vehrs of BYU.

Be a good role model. “Set the example of knowing that activity is as important as brushing your teeth,” says Sandra Perlmutter, former executive director of the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports and an adviser to a company called athleticBaby. It’s good for kids to see you head out on a run. (But don’t take them with you in a Baby Jogger until they’re at least six months old because they lack sufficient control of their heads.) Walk with your little ones. Or get them to “exercise” with you. Every day, Baton Rouge, La., speech pathologist April Garrity, 29, and her daughter, Susanna, do “downward facing dog” and other yoga moves together. Susanna also likes doing push-ups along with her dad. “They see us working out,” says Garrity. And they naturally want to join in the fun.