Owl's Head Pool Jam

I don't get to the skatepark in Bay Ridge enough. That's just a fact of my life. Why is another story.

So when I can get there, I really appreciate it. Yesterday I went down to ride my bike and enjoy the empty park on a Friday morning. At this hour the park is usually dominated by a bunch of older dudes with flexible work schedules or no job at all. It's a good time for an older guy to be in the park.

One of the guys that is often there is named Jeff. He skates, but he also is a workhorse who's often maintaining Owl's Head's sweet pool:


There's not really any maintenance provided by the Parks Department, so it is skaters like Jeff that keep the place in shape with a little bonding compound and fresh paint:


Jeff let me know that today there would be a large jam at the park and so I decided to dust off my board for the second time this year and see what skating rather riding the park would feel like.

This is what the jam looks like:


Lots of guys hanging around the pool, an impressive number of them in the late-thirties to late-fifties age range. A tent, a lot of banners, and a table full of old-school decks:


This is was a comfortable atmosphere for me to get back to skating again. Very little attitude, some encouragement, and a plain joy for riding. I did not spend much time in the pool, but others were ripping it up:


I mostly hung out in the smaller bowl, making my way up to a couple of fifty-fifty stalls and getting my carving back. Meanwhile, the vets were airing out, blasting grinds, and otherwise working the pool:


Pretty awesome. Makes me want to get back more often and get into better skating shape.