There is a Game of Skate this Saturday at the flatground spot at NC State. It’s 4 bucks to enter but all proceeds go to charity. The Gravy Games are coming up at the Factory in November. And we are doing a photo show up at Endless Grind on Friday the 13th in November. Oh yea, the Durham park officially opens on November 7th, word is Toy Machine is doing a demo there that same day.

The Barrel Monster lives, and this time he has a mate. Raleigh, Hillsborough street.

Concrete cumming out of the tube to make the pool skateable. Hard work kids, hard work.

Durand and Guatney smoothing things out so you can get a nice clean roll.

Kind awesome to think a few months ago none of this existed.

Didn’t realize there was gonna be a euro gap in the park until we built it. Whose got gap from top of the euro kicker into the quarter? Robert Clark?

SMF. So much fun.

Kohen and Martin are collaborating on a piece inside of Ujamaa skate shop, which is only a short skate from the park. Go check it out.

In closing… do what feels right.

There was one kid who would go to that camp for 2 weeks, then go to Woodward immediately afterwards. The kid was Alex Midler and he just wanted to eat cereal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. A friend sent me this clip today and I figured it’s worth sharing for you.

Alex just turned 11 but this footy is from when he was 10.

Andy Kessler, West 30th Street, Manhattan, 2005. Photo: Ivory Serra

“Part of what makes it so much fun… is that you never know what your gonna come up against”

Read more and watch the video over at the NY Times.

Artisan Skateparks is back on it handling the transition work at the new Durham public park.

The kid who came outta Goldsboro, North Carolina and can currently be found performing his skateboard mastery on The Berrics.

How did he make it this far what can we expect from him in the future?

First off let’s drop a little background history on Josiah. He grew up skating in Goldsboro, North Carolina where pretty much there was nothing to skate. Luckily he had smooth pavement around his house to toy around on and he skated anything and everything, including a knocked down basketball hoop. His brother got him into skating but eventually quit after he found an interest in drinking and drugs. Josiah suggested I leave that out but it came into play throughout our talk.

After seeing how his brother would no longer skate due to his new use of his time Josiah told himself he didn’t want to go that route in life and therefore he pretty much decided then he was going to skateboard as much as possible and that was it. It was all he wanted.

He graduated high school at the age of 16 by being home schooled. His mom was a secretary at a church and the church allowed Josiah to setup ramps and whatever else inside during the winter and summer months when it was too cold or too hot to skate. Josiah isn’t sure how he got away with that for so long because he mentioned he did break some windows and damage some property along the way. But the church didn’t mind until a year or so later when he started really getting awesome with it and that’s when they got a little afraid and decided it was time to stop the skating inside the church.

Currently Josiah is staying at Chris Pastras house in Los Angeles, California and he is an amateur for Stereo skateboards. How did this kid go from skating off wooden trailers in his backyard to skating The Berrics on a daily basis? It was all a matter of being in the right place at the right time.

As it turns out he was on tour with a ramp company from Missouri who went through Arizona. He ended up staying in Arizona at the guys house who makes The Berrics Wax. The guy made a phone call to Jason King over at TB and asked if Josiah could go skate the park. As it turns out the ramp company was going to LA to film a promo for their video and they stopped by TB.

When I started talking to Josiah he was telling me about how he just recently completed being a stunt double on the show Cold Case. I guess they had a replica of Love Park which was called Peace Park and 2 skaters were battling for the best trick in the world. The other skater was being stunt doubled by Billy Marks. I think Josiah’s character ended up losing the battle and killing Billy Mark’s character to steal his trick. TV shows, gotta love em. He mentioned all the other actors were telling him about joining the actors union, but Josiah mentioned he was gonna stick to the skating for now.

I asked Josiah what his daily life was like in LA and he said he’s been working hard on a Recruits for TB. We ended up discussing TB’s impact on skateboarding and how it’s really pushing skateboarding. I compared it to his church back in the day and how it was kinda like that in a sense that it’s a spot he can go to and just shred nonstop. Josiah said everyday he’s up there he feels like a kid at a demo because there are so many people there just ripping on a regular basis.

Josiah’s been skating with Billy Marks and says that guy is a true professional in the sense that he gets things done. He mentioned Billy talks about the most random things whiles hes skating but he constantly destroys everything. He also mentioned how he was around for the filming of Mike V’s recent clip. He said Mike V is one of the most motivated skateboarders he’s ever seen in his life and how he will stop at nothing to get what he wants to get.

Josiah is one of the rare skaters out there who doesn’t drink alcohol, smoke cigs, or do drugs. You can see it in his style. You can also hear the drive in his voice. He said he just always wants to be happy and focused on skating without any distractions. Sometimes this focus can drive him insane. He said he pushed it super hard the first few days he was in LA and he pretty much destroyed his body because he was never stopping to skate. That nonstop energy caused him to have to take a week and a half off because his legs were so wrecked. This kids on a mission.

Aside from skateboarding Josiah is a super talented artist. His church’s pastors son was a computer programmer and kinda turned Josiah onto working with computers. He says he’s glad he has that skill underneath him because when he’s older it will come in handy if he wants to run a business. Creativity is key.

The crazy thing is Josiah led me to my next adventure in life by suggesting we originally do the interview on AOL instant messenger. Once we realized me typing super fast on a laptop and him pecking away on an iphone just wasn’t gonna work we switched to the old school voice-phone.

Oddly enough I haven’t used AOL instant messenger in years and while I was on it for the 20 minutes or so an old friend sent me a message and informed me Justin Brock, Brad Staba, Theotis Beasley, David Clark, and Dan Plunkett were all in Winston-Salem. A phone call later and now I’m catching a train in 3 hours to attempt to go meet up with those cats.

I told Josiah this and he said Theotis is one of the nicest people he has ever met and the rumors are true about that. Josiah mentioned when Theotis was leaving he put his hand on Josiah’s shoulder and looked into his face to tell him goodbye. He said he’s almost abnormally nice, but its the best and he’s the raddest dude on the Earth.

In closing I am sure you are gonna be seeing a lot more from Josiah in the future. He’s got a level head, an upbeat and stoked attitude, and you know all he wants to do is skate to the best of his abilities.

Thanks again to Josiah for taking the time to talk. You guys can see him today up on The Berrics playing Cairo Foster in a game of skate.

Note to viewer, there’s a few penises in there but along with the occasional nude dude resides a uniquely crafted naked female, so enjoy your stay.

And if any of you ever get the chance, go skate Baltimore, that place is very very one of a kind, especially the red light district. The hookers will tempt you, the free entry to strip clubs will pull at your desires, the crackheads will looked even more fucked up, and the one religious guy across the street from it all will be telling you your going to hell.

I first met Robert way back in the day when I was working up at Project 58. He was a young kid who would show up to skate nonstop. He definitely had talent. At one point he got into some trouble and was sent off to prison. I recently caught up with him and asked him how that experience changed his life and also learned more about just what life behind bars consisted of.

I tried to record our conversation but my recorder’s batteries decided to die on me. I’ve had that thing for nearly 7 years now so I can’t really blame it.

You know that point where your talking to a friend and things turn to a more serious tone instead of a joking around happy go lucky tone?

Rails, Robert and I were kicking it up at the Durham Courthouse as the sun set. A homeless guy walked by and watched us skate for a little bit. We were enjoying ourselves for sure. Such a simple device and simple pleasure. A piece of wood with wheels, some waxed up granite ledges and smooth ground. No controllers, no advanced physics (well…), just us young adults living it up.

I tend to take these times for granted, just imagine all the people you’ve skated with and how at some of those sessions you just weren’t having fun. It can be a toss up at times, the ups and the downs. Luckily for most of us we’ve never had to experience a life of seclusion and entrapment. Most of us have enjoyed the freedom of being able to leisurely skate.

I remember when Robert got sent away, it didn’t really affect my life. It was just a friend who you used to see all the time and now he was on his own path. Robert said everything happens for a reason, and thats true. Some of us will go on to do great things, some of us will die young, some of us will outlive the rest, some will succeed, some will fail…

I have to admit, it’s good to see Robert out skating again.

As I asked Robert about prison it was a quiet serious talk. You could hear the tone of his voice change, no laughter really, except for when he told all the people he was on lock down with that he would grind any rail on the property if they gave him a board. I asked him if prison systems would ever allow skateboards, instantly he said nope. Not even considering a skateboard as a weapon Robert let me know people would wreck each other with those things. He said he saw a guy get his face bashed in by a barbell, and also saw a guy get his neck sliced. Prison life ain’t pretty.

I asked him about the food and he mentioned in prison the food was actually pretty decent, a lot better than jail. He said they would get cake with real icing. He mentioned the real icing twice throughout our conversation, just goes to show you how the little things in life make all the difference when the rest are taken away.

While in prison he watched Life with Ryan. I’ve heard so many peoples views on that show and it was nice to hear someone who didn’t critique it but was just hyped to be exposed to some sort of skateboard lifestyle. He said each episode got him more stoked to get out and shred.

In prison there was a fight club. You were given a number and then all numbers were placed into a hat and drawn randomly. Whoever you got matched up with, you had to fight or suffer the consequences of getting bullied around for the rest of your stay. Robert said he fought out of necessity, he had to stick up for himself and show he wasn’t afraid. Luckily he said fights weren’t an everyday experience.

He mentioned he read the Book of John in the Bible but didn’t want to explain his interpretation from it.

It’s good to see Robert back out in the world free from constraint. I just hope it stays that way because when he steps on a board, people take notice.

Robert’s been ripping on the board, let’s hope he can continue to kill it with less legal troubles, and more street destruction.

Rise to rest

Lifers

The Lucky 13

Backpack and a board