SKATEBOARDING : WHAT IT ALL MEANS
Almost everyone I know has heard me say that skateboarding saved my life, but I don’t know if anyone has taken me serious. The thing is that this statement is true. Before I found that skatepark I was at the lowest of my lows. I was struggling to get up everyday and survive. I felt no purpose in my life other than going to work, paying the bills I have brought myself to have. So when skateboarding came back into my life the world seem to change. I found a way to let out all the frustration and unhapiness. The feeling of those four wheels underneath me feeling as though I am going mach speed, “Warp speed Mr. Scott”.
My history began when I was a small boy, a friend and I went to see Back to the Future in the local theatre. The first reaction I had out of that theatre was that I wanted a skateboard. Don’t get me wrong I had played around the local kids boards, plastic banana board. But now there was a change, the board were bigger and you could jump on them. With a collection of about $36 from allowance and birthday money I bought a Variflex skateboard at my local department store. This is where it all began…
So with a 7 year break I came back into this world of skateboarding. I have met lots of great people and found some old friends
in the process. I wouldn’t have asked for anything more out of all of this.
I met Tate Nations back in February of 2002 at Park X in Jackson. He was a web developer for Worldcom. And had a passion to get back into skateboarding as I had a few months before…
But in the midst of all of this he had a plan, being that we were both web developers he wanted to make a web site that encompessed the aspects of skateboarding, but all based in what happened in Mississippi. So blindly coming back into this activity
that had been deemed “EXTREME” from EXPN and other promotions from the commercial world, we started SkateMS.com in March of 2002. It’s kind of funny to look back now… The content delima we faced and the need to have photos of all the skaters and places around the state. The
first photos we had were pictures that Tate had taken himself skating in Brookhaven (The infamous Sprite bottle!) and ones that I have taken from video clips of Todd Martin and I. Really funny to think about it now. To kick it all off Nate, Todd (Big Todd), & I went to meet Tate at Copiah Lincoln College about 10 minutes from Tate and this was our first real photo session, if you want to cal it that. Co-Lin Session.
This was our start, the beginning of it all… And so in March 2003 will will have our first year complete and the progress we have made on the union of skaters in the state and surrounding area is phenomenal. It has been a great ride and I am sure it will continue. Two more park have plotted their ground in the state and who knows what is next.
I just wanted to thank everyone for their effort, hard work and patience through the beginning. And special thanks to Bob and Cindy for the love & reason they have given us to get this off the ground.
Thanks…Austin
