The local police have to go by the new skatepark and enforce the helmet law. I’m sure the police aren’t thrilled about having to listen to a bunch of teens and twentysomethings swear and moan and wheedle. And I’m sure the teens and twentysomethings would rather not have to moan and wheedle. They seem to like the swearing, though there’s less of that than most people figure there is at a skatepark.
Bottom line? You can’t make someone whose biology is dumping hormones into his bloodstream stand still and do something that’s going to endanger his place in the sociological pecking order. Wearing a helmet is not cool. In other words. Rebelliousness, recklessness and Cool are far more important than whether your Mom is going to sue the city if you crack your skull. Seriously, 99% of skaters aren’t going to crack their skulls, but there will be that one kid who does. And we’re going to have to watch his mom- with tears and dollar signs in her eyes- explain how the city was remiss and now little (20 year old) Darnault (his friends called him ‘Hump’) can’t feed himself and she ain’t gonna do it and who gon’ pay for the nursing home?
On the upside, the last time we were at the skatepark and the cops announced that you couldn’t skate without a helmet, my son got to skate the big bowl for nearly ten minutes solid- him being one of the, I guess, five people who had a helmet on to start with. It took ten whole minutes for the older kids to quit complaining at the cops, go get their helmets, swallow their pride (the hardest part of the ordeal), and put on their helmets to resume skating. Couple of guys had that Laaaaast little bit of rebelliousness they had to fly, so they wore their helmets…gasp… without strapping them on. Means they had to skate with one hand absurdly holding the tops of their heads. Looked dumber than dirt, but at least they didn’t have to strap up the helmets. That would have been… I dunno, something harsh on them.
How much more quickly would they have put on headgear if the headgear itself proclaimed how much they disdained it?
I should have custom helmets made to sell out there. Really.
