From the sidewalk artists and street performers to the pot doctors and the drum circles, Venice Beach is the sideshow Mecca for the tourists, the homeless and the fitness freaks.
I’ve been to Venice so many times that I’m bored by it. Except one place never tires me—the skatepark. The undulations, bowls and rails mesmerize me.
As a thirteen-year-old growing up in the South I loved skateboarding. California was skateboarding. Alabama wasn’t. I rode my bike to the drug store and bought every issue of Skateboarder and Transworld Skateboarding as soon as they came out. I idolized Tony Alva and Stacey Peralta. I dreamed of empty swimming pools, Kryptonic wheels, Tracker trucks and Hobie decks.
Most of the pools in my hometown were above ground. Half the roads weren’t paved. My own driveway was gravel. I lived vicariously through the magazines then, and I live vicariously through my camera now. I’m thirteen again.