Skate Anatomy: Tim O’Connor

Skate Anatomy
Tim O’Connor

LEFT SIDE
Broken Wrist and AIDS Scare
Launched my shoe off in the air like Simon Woodstock while attempting a back lip at the Brooklyn Banks handrail. Landed in a position that wasn’t too comfortable and broke a bone in my wrist and dislocated it. Plus, the ground at the bottom of the stairs where I landed is washed nightly with piss and AIDS.

Broken Thumb
Fell on a switchback heel down two stairs and wedged my thumb into a glory hole in the wall. Felt something suck on it really quick while it was stuck in the hole. Oh yeah, baby, suck my injury. It looked like a twisted up pork chop when I pulled it out.

Merked Ankle
Sprained my left ankle so many times I’ve lost count. I think I sprained it Pi times. Anybody who knows me knows that I can sprain my ankle just by staring at the mo’ fo’. That joint is chronically merked.

Arrowed
Flew off my friend’s jump ramp into a small tree. I climbed out of the shrub with a stick stuck in my arm. My friend ripped it out and it was all sorts of dramatic, like in the movies when somebody gets an arrow yanked out.

Deflowered Foot
Broke my wimpy, virgin foot doing a frontside 360 ollie off a weak-ass skatepark ledge.

Flesh Wound
Fell on a Canadian skatepark ramp and slit open my arm on the edge of the metal at the bottom. Got a couple moose hair stitches to seal up that gash on my limb.

CENTER
Circumcision
I got circumcised shortly after I came out of my mom. I don’t remember it so well but I bet that shit hurt like the dickens. Fashion over function, baby. I might get reversed circumcised and get that shit glued back on in the near future.

Tee Ball With Head
My older brother hit me in the dome piece with a Louisville Slugger when I was 5. I cried. I also got a bunch of stitches in my forehead so my thoughts wouldn’t leak out.

Soda Popped
My other brother threw a full soda can at my face, and the rim of it hit me in the upper lip. Got some more stitches for that one. I also tried to ride my brother’s Gator board and clocked myself in the bottom lip with it. The cut went all the way into my mouth and I got stitches again.

Tinker Toy to the Dome
My brother randomly threw a giant Tinker Toy in the air like that monkey that threw a bone in 2001: A Space Odyssey. It magically landed sticking into my head. Yet again, stitches.

Mini Stab Wounds All Over
My older brother got a brand-new electric pencil sharpener back in the 1980s. He was all psyched and would sharpen No. 2s to see how sharp they could get. Then he would throw them at me like Chinese stars to see if they’d stick in my young supple flesh. Some of them did.

Swollen Member
Sprained my boner while learning to jerk off when I was eking my way through puberty.

Black Eye
Heath Kirchart had a black eye on this one tour, and I liked the way it looked, like a bully. I hadn’t had one in awhile, so I asked him to punch me so I could have a black eye, too. He was more than happy to do it and promptly snuffed me in my eye socket, simultaneously putting a little chip in my incisor tooth. He hit me really friggin’ hard, so I drank booze immediately after.

Board to the Dome
Jumped by some hoods in SF and hit over the head with my own pro model board pretty much right when I turned pro. Mad weak, son.

Knock Out
Fell on my head and knocked myself out in Tampa while trying to back 50-50 a kinked hubba thing. I hardly remember what happened and, due to that injury, I’m definitely forgetting other injuries that I’ve incurred.

RIGHT SIDE
Compound Fracture
While attempting a back Smith on a miniramp, I fractured my lower right prepubescent arm to where the bone popped out of my skin. My arm looked like a f**kin’ whammy bar. Right after I did it, my friend’s dog jumped on me and was trying to lick the bone marrow sauce out of my bone. That’s not a lie.

Sprained Ankle
Sprained this ankle just as many times as my other one. I’m looking to buy a new ankle setup off eBay or something, if anybody’s selling them. Children of the world: cherish your brand-new ankles.