This is Steve Crandall, mid school BMX rider going back to the early '90's, owner of FBM Bikes, guy who lives in an old school bus, and artist who paints coffee cups. And an old friend of mine going back to about 1994, I think. If you're choosing between reading this post and watching the video above, watch the video. I just did, and it's a great piece about stripping life down to the the things that mean the most to you. That's not for everyone, but there are great rewards in certain aspects of life for those who do it.
I first met Steve in 1994, I think. I walked downstairs to the kitchen of the apartment in Huntington Beach that I shared with Chris Moeller and Timmy Ball. As was often the case in those days, several people I didn't know were sleeping on our floor. They got in late the night before, when I was already asleep. When you have Chris Moeller, owner of the hardcore, fledgling, punk rock, BMX company, S&M Bikes, as a roommate, your apartment becomes a magnet for wayward BMXers from across the country and around the globe. So heading downstairs to breakfast and finding the couches and floor space taken by a bunch of sleeping strangers was a pretty normal thing. They were all BMXers, and usually pretty respectful of our place. We all slept on each others couches, and living room and motel floors when traveling in those days, to keep costs down.
I think Chris was making tea, and I asked who the guys were. He told me the first three or four guys, and then pointed to the corner below the "L" in the couches. "Those are the FBM guys, Steve Crandall and his guys." Before long, the whole group was up, and the day's riding commenced. I'd heard of the FBM guys, and may have seen them at a contest, but that weekend was when I got to really know them. Nothing in particular stands out in my mind, it was a typical weekend hanging out, having fun, and riding with some BMXers, in this case from New York.
From then on, Steve and the FBM guys were a group I'd see at contests, session with on occasion, and party with now and then. That was the early 90's. I kept riding, but largely faded from the SoCal scene after I moved out of Moeller's condo in 1995.
More than a decade later, as a fat, HAS BEEN BMX guy, I wound up in North Carolina, lost all my video footage, and started blogging about things I experienced in the 1980's and 1990's in the BMX/freestyle and skateboard worlds. I started reconnecting with old friends here on the interwebs. Steve was one of those I've been reading posts from, commenting on, and keeping up with since.
In his video above, I realized we've had some similarities over the last year or so, besides being named Steve (which means, "crown" or "crowned one" and the pinnacle of human achievement, or something like that). We've both stripped our lifestyles down. He lives in a bus, roaming the country. I left where I was living last year, and because of lack of money, lived in a tent as a homeless guy for 9 1/2 months to get my art career going. We've both taken to doing a lot of artwork in the last year or two. We both had our first art show over this past year. We both do blogs. We are both largely stoked, though sometimes frustrated, with our stripped down lifestyles, and the things that allows us to do. Like, more art.
The weird little bit for me was the coffee thing. I don't drink coffee. I like coffee flavored candy and coffee flavored ice cream, but I just don't like coffee flavored coffee. And I don't like crazy, expensive latte's and stuff. I wake up with a cold Diet Coke. Which is dumb, I know, but that's the way it is for right now. The coffee connection comes from the Winston-Salem Journal artist profile of me that promoted my first show, at an old school music shop called Earshot Music. I met Lisa, the journalist, and the photographer in the cafe area of the new W-S library. As it turned out, the photo that wound up in the paper had the morning barista here, best known locally as L.B. the Poet, in the background of the picture.
He's not just a guy that writes a poem now and then and reads it at an open mike event. L.B. LIVES poetry. He performs incredible spoken word pieces, he does workshops for all ages, and he promotes and hosts poetry-centric events all over central NC. He's a force of nature. There's a really cool poetry scene here in Winston-Salem right now, and that's the group I've most clicked with in the creative scenes here. In some weird synchronicity (I don't believe in coincidence), I met L.B. the day after my artist profile came out, when I bought a Diet Coke and told him he wound up in the background of my photo in the paper. I told Lisa, the journalist about him a few weeks ago, and he just landed an artist profile in the W-S Journal as well.
One day, while drawing next to the coffee bar, I heard L.B. tell a woman, "I don't just serve coffee, this is a cup of love." He wasn't flirting, he's a happily married husband and dad, he's just one of those people who goes way beyond at his day job, to make people get their day off right.
As synchronicity played out, I wound up hiding in a corner drawing, as the "live artist" at an event called Wine and Rhymes at the Designs, Vines, and Wines studio here. I didn't realize that L.B. was hosting the event, and he noticed I was hiding in a corner drawing right after performing one of his pieces. Inspiration took over, and I did a quick drawing of a coffee cup, and wrote "L.B.'s Cup of Love" on it, harking back to the lady at the coffee bar earlier that day. Then I got the idea for a poem, and literally drew the picture and wrote a short poem, while, L.B., my new roommate Reece (promoter of Wine & Rhymes/poet) were performing. When I finished the picture, my first thought was, "Man, I owe Steve Crandall a royalty for drawing a coffee cup." I've been seeing his coffee cup paintings on Facebook for a year or so. I gave the drawing to L.B., and he was way more stoked on it than I expected.
So as us two Steve's head into new aspects of our life and creativity, the lowly coffee cup created a weird little full circle. Funny how life works. And how art and BMX bring all kinds of people together.
A couple years ago, when I was just beginning to focus on my artwork as a way to start making a living again, I drew a pic of Steve Crandall and sent it to him. It looks pretty rough now, after drawing dozens more picture since. And when I made up all kinds of sayings for "FBM" in the background, I didn't realize he'd quite drinking, so I wrote a few beer related sayings. Sorry about the Steve. When you roam through central NC the next time, I'll buy you a cup of coffee... and me a Diet Coke.
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