Mail drop.

Confound every security clown when skating downtown at: Mall Drop c/o THRASHER PO Box 884570 San Francisco, CA 94188-4570

PHILLY FREEDOM

I just wanted to say goodbye to the best place on Earth. We will all miss LOVE park and it's a shame that it has to end this way. Ever since I started to skate I always dreamed of going to LOVE; now it seems that my dream will not come true. I'm sure many others had the same dream. Now it's lost. Farewell LOVE, we'll miss you forever. Shout out to Interskate skatepark and all my friends in Shreveport.

Zach Imondi

Shertz, Texas

Memories keep everything alive. T-ed

POUR MEN

I was recently flipping through some old issues of Thrasher--to be specific, it was July 1998--and came across the "Spot Search 1998." On page 41, lower right, there is a nice-shaped kidney. It says it's in Spokane, WA. It's actually in Liberty Lake, WA. When we recently moved to this area and found the pool (or at least the coping), it was completely filled with dirt. No worries though, the search continues... I liked the article on the Pocatello, ID (Southern Idaho) '70s skatepark, September 2002, page 84. A bunch of us climbed the barbed wire fence and skated it illegally for a good four hours before we got chased out. This was in 1989. Thanks for the article. Cool to see a spot from the past. Hope it reopens.

Trevor Briggs

Post Falls, Idaho 

Hailey is the remedy. T-ed

PEEP THIS

What's up Thrash peeps. I'm writing you for every letter you get from these little pricks who complain about every little fuckin' thing. I'm glad skateboarding got big. I hear people bitching about how skateboarding used to be this thing that nobody but us skaters knew about. Now every time you turn on the TV you see the Vans' Triple Crown or Slam City. I think that shit's great. We're popular now. Everyone used to hate us. Another thing that everyone bitches about is the lifestyle that we live. If you don't like runnin' from the cops and shit, you might as well just hang up your shoes and be a pussy-ass rollerblader. Hey, we live the fast life--it rules being a skater. Sex, beer, and (of course), skating. Ever since I picked up a board my entire life has changed up. Right now it isn't really so great. I am locked down in a reform school for flipping out at school and for threatening my teacher. All I have left to say is that if you ain't got the heart to just say fuck it and do it, then skating ain't for you . And for all y'all little whiners, Shut the fuck up. Live to skate, skate or die, skate forever.

Phillip Creech

Kinston, NC

Teachers hate skateboarding bro! T-ed

ALMOST FAMOUS

California is some sissy's dream. I wanted to be famous growing up, like Neil Blender famous. You know, like Hosoi or Gator famous--alright, maybe not Gator. Like mediocre famous. Medium famous people really are the people who keep life going. Skateboarders are all essentially medium famous. You Thrasher writers call them "lifers." I call us Mickey Rooney and Robert Pollard meet Natas Kaupus. By the way, everyone on the East Coast thought he was a pussy for skating a shoe for some French company. Everyone still hates the French. He made up for that by working in porn.

Some won skateboarding. But what sets apart all of us from the rest of the world is that we all express an art form, provide entertainment to people watching and don't forget exercise (that is a factor dude, just think of all the people your age who decided to join a flicking gym).

We skaters certainly have spirit, which can be as wondrous as rolling on a skateboard outside by the museum steps. OK, so this is why I am writing you--not to skit on California and all of its colors of the rainbow, but to say: Northern California, here I come! I hope the plane makes it.

Anonymous

Columbus, Ohio 

I'm leavin'. T-ed

SPOT SURGERY

Man, this is gay. Transworld has this section dedicated to Hubba Hideout. They ask for readers to enter their Hubba "dream team" if you will. This annoys me because half of these people have never seen Hubba or even know what the hell they're talking about. They voted Koston first, and that's OK by me, but what about my dog Lenny Kirk? Switch backside tailslide and switch frontside 50-50s? That's insanity. He's nowhere on their list. These people should save all the San Francisco facts for the real folks behind the scenes. Mind you, a lot of Hubba wizardry that I witnessed first-hand took place like five years ago. Also, they didn't mention Lavar or Danny Garcia, who both played around on Hubba, making me green with envy. (Lavar: switch tailslides, Danny: nollieflip noseslide).

Roman

Brentwood, CA

What about Steve Olson? T-ed

BLESSED MESS

Skateboarding is my life. Unlike anything else this world has to offer me, a board, four small wheels, and a waxed curb take me places physically and mentally that nothing else can. For the past eight years I've indulged in my passion only through a monthly subscription to Thrasher and my dreams, where on those really special occasions I can wake with the sounds of trucks on rails and the slapping of tails still ringing in my ears. That, my friends, is no joke. I miss it that much. Sometimes in conversation with acquaintances the question will come up, "What do you miss most about freedom?" Without the slightest hesitation, I say, "Skateboarding." The looks I get in return are shocking to say the least. "Dude, what about chicks? Beer? Parties?" Obviously these people have never spent all-nighters ollieing the gap in downtown or doing bluntslides on a mini under spotlights, listening to Minor Threat or Dead Kennedys. Yes it is true, I'm in jail--I've been systematically removed like any termite or roach" (prop s to Tool for that quote off their first album Opiate, a must have). But I am still a living, breathing, 28-year-old skater from the East Coast, who one day soon will be cast through these gates that bind me to the streets once again, once again to live out what little life I am blessed to live. Blessed, because of all the things the authorities have taken from me, they left by far my most prized possession--the love of skateboarding.

Michael Betts

Melbourne, Florida

MY STICK

Having ridden skateboards for the better part of two decades, I made the switch from shortboards to longboards. The technical style of the (primarily) younger skaters interests me from a visual standpoint; however, the pure joy of a soulful carve down a gently sloping hill and a high speed Bert on a bank are where I find both relaxation and the ability to vent the days' frustration. In the October 2002 issue you printed an article called 'Subvert the Dominant Paradigm." In the article it talks about the "sour milk odor from people who are totally clueless...how many Barneys do you see flailing around on their longboards, throwing a chaka while sporting the latest hempen accessories?" It is unfortunate that, rather than looking for and finding the thrill and joy those longboarders see in their skating, it is easier to judge them as "Barneys" who don't understand. Many of us who longboard have been skating for decades, have seen trends come and go, and have decided on what we want to get out of skateboarding. I hope he opens his eyes and begins to see because we, the soul skaters, those who will skate forever and are not looking for sponsorships and big photo spreads, need to really stick together for the betterment of skate culture.

Skateboarding is an art form. What brush you choose and what kind of picture you decide to paint is to be respected for what it is. A truly educated person doesn't judge an artist by his choice of brush, but by the beauty of the picture. And there is beauty in all varieties of skateboarding, from the classical surf-style to the modernist street. An educated skater is more likely to keep skating because he/she will know that there are different directions to take their art and they can always keep creating new, spontaneous works in whatever style.

David Thornton

Memphis, TN

Longboards suck because they can't fit in the trunks of many smaller, economically-correct Japanese import cars that are so popular today. T-ed