Getting Wood

“It's huge!” That was my initial reaction upon unboxing the Magneto Bamboo Dancer. Longboards, by definition, are long boards. Dancing longboards, although not the longest of the longboards, are longer than typical longboards because they are designed to serve as a dancing platform on wheels. This beautifully finished plank of wood was 46 inches long, 9 inches across, and weighed a hefty 9.5 lbs. Carrying it from the living room through the front door felt like transporting a small step ladder using tyrannosaurus arms. I wasn’t a newb to skateboarding so the basic stuff like stepping on, pushing, turning, and braking came to me right away. But, due to the increased length and weight of the longboard, slightly more advanced maneuvers, like the backside pivot where you step on the nose of the board and rotate the entire thing 180 degrees, were a lot harder to pull off. Another issue I had was with speed. Regular skateboards have smaller wheels which are great for executing technical tricks like treflips and crooked grinds, but are suboptimal as long distance transport. The wheels tend to get stuck in cracks and hung up on small debris like pebbles and hypodermic needles. They also require much more pushing to maintain speed. Longboards with their larger, softer wheels are designed to roll forever. They’re great for cruising around town, but they suck when a missed landing or off-balanced stumble can shoot the board away forcing you to sprint after it into incoming traffic like a wily coyote. Of course, before I had acclimated to reliably performing the basics, I had already injured myself multiple times attempting—and failing—to ollie, pop shuvit, kickflip and no comply. My ankles, shins, knees, thighs, chest, and abdomen did not appreciate this. I also tried my first ever longboard specific tricks like ghost ride and tiger claw, along with some dance moves like cross steps and Peter Pan. I spent half the attempts with my arms flailing in the air as my unsteady legs fought to keep me upright and the other half tripping over the board. Occasionally I’d even slam into the concrete narrowly avoiding serious injury via well conditioned ninja roll. In mid-December of year one pandemia—2 months after getting the longboard—I rolled my ankle severely injuring my left foot and putting myself out of commission for a month. It probably would have been smarter to ease into the fancy tricks but this was a dancer board and sometimes you gotta dance! But first, I had to regain the ability to walk. *music provided by www.bensound.com This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nhandu.substack.com