My Shack, My Castle

I produced this pod with Allison Muir for the Yahoo! Current Project. It was number 2 in a 3 part Skatopia mini series. That's why it has the Skatopia open after the graphics open. The other two pods were lost with the rest of the Yahoo! Current Project.

Full Disclosure: I am proud to admit that Micah Friedman is a friend of mine who lived in my San Francisco living room for two months with his brother Gabe, and a skater we'll call Crawdad.

When Allison and I decided to fly to Ohio and trekk ourselves out to Skatopia, I had no idea that Micah was living there. Although when I started telling friends that I was going to Skatopia and getting lots of.... "Really? Are you sure you want to do that? It's gnarly over there." I also started hearing rumors that Micah might be around.

Weeks later when Allison and I drove through the pitch-black gates of Skatopia at 2 in the morning a shadowy figure walked in front of our truck. He approached the driver’s side window so I rolled it down, and when he leaned in, I saw that it was Micah Friedman. We both exchanged a "what are you doing here" and then he hoped in our rented Explorer and we drove to the main barn where his brother Gabe happened to be drinking with the Skatopians. Apparently Micah had been there living, working, and skating for months, but was finally ready to leave. So Gabe drove up from their hometown of Oklahoma City to "rescue" him.

After we picked up Gabe at the barn the Friedman's convinced us to take the Explorer through the woods and up the mountain to Micah's Shack so that no Skatopian's would have a chance to blow it up... yeah they're known for blowing cars up over there. So in the pitch-black of night I drove up a densely wooded hill and parked near a campfire in front of Micah's Shack, which was built just far enough away from the madness to be a great refuge during the Skatopia shoot... Many times I escaped from the madness of the lower valley to drink beer and eat hot dogs in the relative peace that surrounded Micah's amazing little home.

A small example of that madness played out like this… One night on my way down to the party, I was hiking down a steep part of the hill in the dark and a bomb exploded about twenty feet to the right of me, knocked me off my feet, and sent me careening through the woods to the bottom of the hill. The light on my camera was destroyed, but I survived. That's just Skatopia.

I am aware that when some people watch this pod they think Micah is a crazy hillbilly kid, and it some ways I guess that's the role he played at Skatopia. But I must say that Micah and his brother Gabe are two of the most interesting and eccentric characters I've ever met. They are artists and free spirits who seem to find themselves in the most bizarre scenarios all across America from train hopping to living in a shack at Skatopia. I feel truly lucky to know them and I can say without out a doubt that I probably would not have survived my Skatopia experience without them. I hope that some of Micah’s brilliance comes across in this pod and not just his novelty.

Thanks to Bruce Martin (the owner of Skatopia) for letting us shoot. The Friedman's for being so rad, and Allison Muir my partner at the time and co-producer of this pod. Also thanks to the other editors that worked on this, namely Aaron Hull and Natalie Proctor.

awww. he does look like a lost boy who needs a shower :)

FUCK YEAH MICAH!

JACKSON KELLY FROM LAKE THUNDERBIRD!

emily jackson and justin!

KEEP UP THE WORK!!!! loving it

Sounds like heaven.