from Mark Heuss on 5 Oct 2018
Handlauf Monolog – a delightfully slow blading documentary starring Paul Skirde, Mirek Ragan & Lukas Miodonski. Shot & cut by Mark Heuss.
“„I want you to face the prominent possibility of leaving this place, having done nothing at all.” Those were my initial words to Mark, when we first arrived to conquer this tripple kinked beauty; guess I wasn’t so sure after all. The last time I confidently trusted my shoulder enough to actually try and beat a handrail was way back in 2013, in the streets of Germany’s Barcelona of spots: Stuttgart-Benztown. Back then I was six months post-op after my second surgery and completely in love with what the doctors did with my wasted joint. Three years later though it had all gone to hell and beyond, I was left with what is now my third surgery; the whole kit and caboodle. Torn ligaments, wasted cartilage and the remains of what six years of regular dislocations do to your bone matter. Not only did these years take their toll on my body, they also planted the seed of what is every blade addict’s worst nightmare: fear. Fear of doing more damage, fear of another surgery and the obvious fear of going through the painful process of dis- and relocating my shoulder.
Nevertheless I kept on trying things, that I thought of as being a subject of my complete and utter control. Admittedly they weren’t always what I dreamed them to be, but they were real and manageable.
In the year 2017 honor and duty called in the form of a six month internship at the headquarters of Powerslide near Bayreuth; one of the coldest cities I’ve encountered so far. This is where the world of street skating opened up to me again, even though if it was just a bit.
Preconditioned with flu symptoms, I hesitated a little when it came to turning a peaceful evening into a mind game. Not only messed the amount of spontaneity a lot with my ability to focus, it also worsened every behavioral OCD and my almost entirely made up autism a great deal. The rail’s material seemed to be predisposed to give me a merciful way out of my dilemma, as it was almost as sticky as Eugen’s hometown practice rail in Borklyn Zoo. Yet Mark’s colon and the restaurant across the street had different plans for me; it appears that ones visit of an establishments toilet automatically enables access to romantic requisites; god bless the candle supply of Italian restaurants. With my last excuse having turned into ashes in front of my eyes, I didn’t see a reason for me not to actually try and overcome my own mind game.
And what is the worst thing that could possibly happen in a state of complete and utter willingness to focus? It starts with c and ends with haos: polish citizens; meaning no offense. The rolling predecessor of Madam Curie invaded the scene in their big, bad and probably borrowed Hedonskate carriage; I don’t know if the trunk filled to the brim with Club Mate is any indicator to its previous owners, but I guess that somewhere in or around Bayreuth a group of hipster boys is pretty sad. Having already killed a few of the bottles, the boys clearly affected the mood and for someone that easily gets distracted by the sounds of cars a few blocks away, it didn’t really enhance my focus. It may be noted, that polish people can maintain a ridiculous amount of suspicious energy in the face of internationally witnessed defeat at the world championships of 2018. With enough banana juice and multiple time frames of undisturbed attention, I got closer and closer to actually overcome Bayreuth’s version of the herculean task. In the end it took the better half of two hours, a lot of verbal coping, the inevitable try and error phase and an unnatural amount of handholding with Mark to make it happen. What I learned from this is plain and simple: there isn’t enough banana juice in the world, to numb your senses to the point at which even polish people simply just fade away. Chocolate milk on the other hand is an entirely different story; yet I can’t and won’t succumb to the abuse of substances like this in public. Shout out to the man that made it all possible by reassuring me that I can, Question Mark Heussowitz; not to confuse with the Being John Malkovich. On my way home, weeping with joy, I realized that the key to this whole thing wasn’t my mind, but Marks colon; cheers.”
(SKIRDE 2018)
Find more of my work at http://www.markheuss.com
#handlaufmonolog #blading #documentary