This Strange Spring #2
1 May 2020
“…it's a lesson for my own ego: not everyone is going to get it, not everyone has to, and perhaps what I do isn't that great anyway.”
This Strange Spring: You moved across the country just before all of this kicked off. What was it like leaving New York City right before it became the epicenter of America's covid-19 outbreak?
Ted Barrow: That's a hard question to answer because for me, there was a shift between the deeply personal, nostalgic, and utterly subjective experience of moving, and assessing what all of this time in New York meant to me, and now thinking of New York City in the abstract, as everyone else does, for what it symbolizes to the world. I'll say that it was heartbreaking and awful to leave. I spent most nights in February walking around behind the Central Park reservoir in heaving sobs and tears, listening to Lou Reed's Magic and Loss (very dark) and thinking I could never do this. From my perspective today in California, I can't imagine what my life would be like if I had stayed. I love the subway, I love that New York City forces your sense of personal space to be 6 inches into the next stranger, I love the energy and the feeling of being anonymous and exalted among thousands of people at all times, but it doesn't look like any of that is happening there at the moment, and I feel no guilt or shame about not being there.
Given the current circumstances, you've been able to focus a lot more on @feedback_ts recently. What's it been like to clear through the backlog of clips? And why do you feel that so many of those who feel compelled to comment on your posts have no sense of irony, satire, or much of a sense of humor?
I am not sorting through the backlog of clips, I get sent new ones every day. The reason that I am able to focus more on the account now, as opposed to a few months ago when it was basically shut-down save for the stories, is that, like a lot of other people, I am not working regularly. I am lucky enough to have a job that has kept paying me a base pay while the business is shuttered, so that means that my financial worries are less, and I can devote some time each day to engaging with Instagram. It probably won't last forever, because when work starts back up, whatever that means, I'll devote my time to that, again.
To address your second question, not to be too high-falutin', but people on the internet will argue about anything. The guys that run @bstails get hate messages, for christ's sake. What I do requires just a bit more attention and thought than what 99% of the content on Instagram demands. I'm not saying that what I do is brilliant--far from it--just that I've made this thing that doesn't really fit into the format and medium of instagram, and what people want to see, and how they want to relate to this app. That's ok with me. I'm a weirdo, my family is weird, the way that I use instagram is weird, accordingly. So, as maddening as some of the interactions, responses, and comments that come out of my account can be, it's also a lesson for my own ego: not everyone is going to get it, not everyone has to, and perhaps what I do isn't that great anyway.
Mostly, though, none of us pay very much attention to internet, not in the way that we should, which is why "irony, satire," and perhaps even "much of a sense of humor" are perhaps things we should not expect from people on social media.
Having stumbled onto your online presence only in the last few years, I've always known you as a skater with a fine eye towards art and art history (and stickers). What first attracted you not just to art, but to a deep dive into art? (I ask as someone with a degree in reading books, so there's zero snark or tea.)
Having grown up skateboarding in the late 80's through the 90's, when skaters were often thought of as stupid and uneducated, and I think that I internalized a lot of that prejudice. I was not a terribly good student, like a lot of skaters (and people) I likely suffer from some form of attention deficit disorder, and skateboarding was a way for me to focus on both an aesthetic and physical activity without the pressures of being assessed, as in school grades.
But around the time that I got into my late teens--16, 17 or so, there arose this desire to be "deep." I don't know how else to describe it, but that was a word that was thrown around in those days. It was hard to be "deep," without coming off pretentious. Luckily, within a couple years, I was in college, studying deeply, probably being pretentious, and skating and going to museums. Those two activities have etched my adult brain, and sustained me for the rest of my life (I hope). Art is just a way to exercise that aesthetic part of my brain without the sprained ankles.
Basically being a living skateboarding historian, what has you most excited about the scene these days? And what are some of the recent trends (wheel wells?) you've not been as impressed with? Well, like before March 2020 (and after the point where we have either treatments that truly combat this fucking virus and/or a vaccine, and can congregate at spots again), as well as in this moment of quarantine?
I like it all. Wheel wells, surf pants, Helas caps, mumble trap soundcloud raps, it's all cool. The amazing thing about skateboarding is yes, we do take most of our trends and aesthetics from outside cultures, but we suit them to our needs. Even the corniest shit is cooler when it is used by skateboarders. Some kid just sent me this dogshit AWFUL mix of him skating his dumb fucking Utah park, edited to Slimesito, or whatever, with his beanie rolled up and all the extra flourishes of a burberry-erry type video, and...yeah. Some part of me sincerely thought IT SUCKED. But a bigger part of me knows how much cooler even the worst, most derivative and below-average skate clip is than most things that normies do. You know? Imagine a basketball player shooting hoops in a gym edited to that same music. Or, like, someone polishing their fucking car, as a clip, on instagram, edited to musch. That would truly suck. So, like, my persona on instagram would be outraged by the supposed lack of originality, boring skating, and unimaginative format or whatever, but my sane self knows how fucking amazing any and all skateboarding is, and how even being able to comment on any of it to a crowd of devotees is the most refined and private conversation about what we all care deeply about but what the rest of the world can't even get.
So, if the kids are doing something that I think is stupid, it means that I'm not hip, not that they're dumb. I'm not sure that the quarantine will change the nature of skateboarding in any palpable way. Perhaps the industry, but not how and what we skate.
Do you think we walk out of this bizarre moment in human history into a kinder, gentler world?
Doubtful. The world has never been a kind, gentle place.
I have $275 now, thanks to the stimulus check. Which Sci-Fi Fantasy shirt should I invest in? The orange one? I feel like it should be the orange one, as it will really pop on a clip when I finally can do a backside tailslide, but your opinion means a lot to me. Truthfully, it means everything to me.
Sci-Fi Fantasy has a variety of payment options and layaway plans that can accommodate any budget and willingness to plunge oneself into debt. The important thing is to stay current.
What's a question you wish someone would ask you these days? And if I'd been prescient enough to ask it, what would your answer be?
It would probably be something about Neil Blender.
Daily Drawing Salon