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With the upcoming inauguration of Barack Obama I believe reflection, introspection, accountability and change are the current calls to action. The future of our country is in his hands and also the hands of the children we parents are currently raising. If you, like Whitney Houston, believe this great nations' children are our future I would suggest you take a trip to your local skate park and bring enough alcohol to kill yourself.
Being a father of three boys I manage a multitude of sports, activities and interests. In doing so I have always encouraged my boys to find their own path in life and express themselves in healthy mediums. One of the ways my ten year old has decided to express himself is through skateboarding. When I first bought my athletic young man a skateboard he was all of five years old. This dad had hoped his son would enjoy the challenge of riding a skateboard while at the same time strengthening his core and improving his overall coordination. In my most vivid and real of nightmares I would never have guessed my son would fall in love with skateboarding and its culture.
These days taking your kid to your local skate park is not just an adventure it is an eye opener and reason to drink. Imagine fifty kids all dressed like Jeff Spicolli from Fast Times at Ridgemont High who speak like Eminem, smoke like Snoop Dogg and have more tattoos than Tommy Lee. If these kids are the future of our country I can feel a strong sense of Canadian pride coming on. The majority of the kids who frequent the skate park by our house look like by products of a Scout Troop that was lead by "pro ganja" spokesman Woody Harrelson and Travis Barker.
 Every trip to the skate park not only involves my handsome son performing his favorite tricks and dropping in, but also involves this single dad walking around picking up discarded cigarette packs, empty Big Gulp cups and scattered potato chip bags. I also find myself moving from table to table in an attempt to steer clear of second hand smoke. The highlight of my day usually involves a conversation between my son and I in which he asks to get his ear pierced and me telling him no son of mine is ever going to be a pirate. My son then responds with his usual, "Whatever dad. You are so lame."
I am lame? Since when did full sleeve tats, flat brimmed baseball caps, t-shirts with dragons and skulls on them, neck tattoos become cool in pop culture? At least with the hippies all they had to do when it came time to grow up was cut their hair, buy a few power suits and start paying taxes. With Gen-X we just had to let go of our souring angst and discard our love of flannel so that we could actually get real jobs.
In my opinion kids today are screwed. Nothing screams, "I'll never be CEO of any company" like a few neck tats and gaping hole in your nose where the totally bitchin' skull and crossbones nose ring used to be. The kids of today have no music to define their generation and seem to be somewhat numb to all things around them. What happened to the youth of today? Since when did we are parents allow our children to absorb a sense of entitlement and lose all of their common sense?
Neck tattoos, full sleeve tats, nose rings and jacked up hair are cool and acceptable if you are a professional athlete, celebrity, professional UFC fighter, WWE Wrestler or an actor. But, the reality is 99.9% of the kids who are wandering aimlessly through life bearing such badges of stupidity aren't going to be professional athletes or actors. These kids are going to be raising families of their own while working their asses off in menial jobs. I read an article not too long ago which made the statement that tattoos are now as common place in boardrooms as they are lake Havasu on Memorial Day.
My question to that is simply, "Really?" I spend much of my life in and out of varying types of corporations making presentations to business owners and outside of my occasional trip into a strip club for the all you can eat lunch I rarely see tattoos of any kind except when dealing with the labor pool. I am not sure what board room the author of that article was referring too, but you can bet you aren't going to see the ownership group of Tap Out ringing the bell to open the New York Stock Exchange.
My son may love his skate board and he is even allowed to wear the clothes, but he will never be sitting in the ear piercing chair at the local Claire's store about to get his "pirate" on. My boys have choices, however those choices are limited and also within reason. To all of you chain smoking, neck tattoo having earring wearing, cheeba monkeys out there...Pull up your pants, put on a belt, turn your hat around, laser off that sweet neck tat and get a real job.
YOU HEARD ME!!
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