TZG Portfolio

In this skatepark there is a man who practices the Impossible. He skates, launches up in the air, scoops his board with his shin, flipping it all the way around. He fails to land on the board. He practices over and over, laughing at his failure to land the trick and confessing to his friends that his legs are hurting.

An older man that everyone knows skates in with a boombox on his shoulder and a push broom in his hand. He is wearing a large festive straw hat and sweeps the leaves from the curbs and ramps.

Into the skatepark walks a man pushing a shopping cart. It’s empty and missing a wheel. Metal scrapes on the ground as the cart and the man drag themselves to the nearest trashcan. The man leans in deeply, standing on his toes. He doesn’t find what he is looking for and walks away, leaving the cart behind.

There is a young man sitting on a bench. He cries, “The last residential school closed when I was six years old. It’s hardly history, you know?” Then he talks about working at the beer store.  

On the edge of the part, a homeless couple reclines against a boarded-up building of red brick. In front of them are push trollies with their belongings, adorned with doll heads.  

A tall lanky man comes with his son. The boy wears less safety padding than his father. They both skate, and the son is much more skilled. As the father scales a small ramp, he calls out proudly: “Did you see it?”

A woman in a blue jacket brings a small boy with thick glasses and thicker kneed pads to a skating lesson. She sets up a folding chair. Above her is a maple whose leaves are marked with black circles of tar spot disease. 

An older skater moves through the park, then throws his hands up in the air and yells that he can’t stay here with everyone watching him. Muttering about too many eyes and fixing his ponytail, he walks away.

On a bench, a man is speaking with a young woman who came from Tunisia. He is teaching her English swear words. She knows most of them already.

Dog and man walk through.

A teenager crosses the park on a bike, an unlit cigarette in his mouth. He is wearing a bright red jacket. He rides very slowly, not loosing his balance and not taking his eyes off the corner exit.

On a bench sits a woman in a bright yellow jacket. Her phone battery is low, so she carries a conversation with a man on her left. He takes sips from a metal can which he stores under the bench. Shifting his legs, he knocks the can over and a trail of beer rolling downhill forces the woman to shift far away.

A figure in a wheelchair rolls down the middle of the street alongside the park, navigating between a police station on one corner, the homeless shelter on the other. The figure stops at the water fountain and leans forward unsteadily to take a drink.

Police cars drive by. A small child chases a flock of gray pigeons. They fling their bodies into the air over the park.

A woman in a baggy sweater that matches the colour of her lips says that her husband has died. She had to leave her job as a school bus driver and is now on disability. She is also angry at how few parking spots are around the park.

The man practices the impossible.
Again.

Again.