The Boards We Never Ride Are The Ones That Matter Most

• Posted by Dez Fontaine Sat at 4:30 PM Filed in Personal #memory  #personal growth  #Authenticity  #skateboarding  #boarding culture  15 views
  click to rate

  I got three skateboards sitting in my closet right now that I haven't touched in like two years. One's still got the original grip tape, barely scuffed. Another one's got my name written on the bottom in silver paint marker from 2019. The third one I don't even remember buying, which somehow feels worse than the ones I do remember. And here's the thing that keeps me up at night - those boards matter more to my actual life than the one I ride every single day.

  See, there's this narrative we all buy into about skateboarding being about progression and moving forward and learning new tricks and getting better. And yeah, that's real, that's valid, that hits different when you nail something you've been working on for weeks. But what nobody talks about is what happens when the boards you don't ride start telling you the real story. They're like fossils, except they're fossils of intention instead of dinosaurs.

  I picked up that first one when I was going through something I still don't have words for. Not depression exactly, but that fog where you can't remember if you're sad or just tired of being alive the way you've been living. My boy Marcus said sometimes you gotta let your hands do what your brain can't figure out yet, so I copped this cheap Complete from the local shop and I just existed on it for like three months. Didn't go to spots, didn't film anything, didn't care who saw me or didn't see me. I just rode in circles in the parking lot behind the shuttered Blockbuster and something in my chest started loosening up.

  That board never got to be Instagram material. It never made the cut for the highlight reel. But it got me through something, and when I finally put it away, I kept it because throwing it out felt like throwing out a piece of proof that I survived a version of myself that didn't know if surviving was worth it.

  The second one is different. That's the board from when I thought I was gonna be something in the industry. When I was actually good enough that people were noticing, when sponsors were starting to talk to me, when my entire personality became about whether I could turn skateboarding into a thing that paid the rent. I rode that board like I was in a race and I was losing. Every session was an audition. Every trick was a currency I was trying to exchange for a different life.

  I rode that board into burnout so hard I couldn't look at a spot for six months without feeling anxiety in my stomach. So now it sits there and every time I see it, I remember that version of me who forgot why he picked up a skateboard in the first place. I keep it as a reminder that sometimes the cost of getting what you think you want is exactly what you actually need.

  The third one though? That one's just mystery. Maybe I stole it from somebody. Maybe I bought it at a garage sale. Maybe I found it in a ditch and thought I'd fix it up. The point is I don't know its story and that's actually kind of beautiful in a way. It's like the board version of an unsent letter. It exists with all this potential that'll never get used up because I never will use it up.

  What I'm trying to say is that skateboarding isn't really about the board you ride. It's about what all the boards represent. Every one you've ever had is a conversation between who you were and who you were becoming. The ones you ride are just the ones you're brave enough to be public about. The ones you don't ride are the ones that hold the real secrets.

  So I'm keeping those three boards exactly where they are. Gathering dust, staying silent, remembering things I might've forgotten otherwise. Because sometimes the most important part of skateboarding culture is knowing when to stop moving forward and just sit with where you've already been.

  What board from your past are you actually afraid to let go of?