Forget the behaviouralist bollox

I was wandering through Bushy Park, in Terenure, last weekend. It’s a good spot – alongside the order of the football fields, there’s a bit of wilderness that leads you down to the Dodder river. There, you can walk all the way to Templeogue in one direction or Miltown in the other. Go west and trees shelter you above, while the sound of the river soothes you along the path.

It didn’t used to be like this: the local authorities have worked at developing the walk, carving out a way from Sandymount inwards and making it navigable. It’s a small thing, in a way, easy enough to do – but it’s the kind of feature that helps make the city a better place to live. There’s something elemental about walking beside a river that stirs positive feelings and associations for most people. If you haven’t been there, pick a stretch and give it a go sometime.
On the way back across the park I saw a couple of other initiatives that were new to me at least. One was a sandy area for boules. A number of groups were gathered – many of them continentals – doing that very French thing, looking grave, tossing the balls, and allowing one another the occasional smile of triumph or commiseration. I always thought it was a nice scene in the heart of a village in Provence and it seemed almost as civilised here. These were people engaged in the pursuit of a simple, collegial kind of pleasure…
The other feature was at the opposite end of the spectrum. The first thing I saw was a BMX rider doing a twirl in mid-air and disappearing again out of view. A couple of twirls and spins later, I realised that a concrete skatepark had been installed and that the calibre of some of the riders using it was pretty impressive.
There were thirty or forty guys there, a small number of women among them, doing their thing. You could see immediately the pure joy that’s involved in the sport: there is an element of risk to it, of course, and that’s part of the pleasure, but a far greater element is the marvellous sense of freedom that it affords – the hit that it gives – being able to defy gravity. It’s no small thing, whether you’re on a bike or a board, to be capable of flying and spinning and turning mid-air – and doing it all in such a measured, instinctive, graceful way that you land upright and sail back around to the posse. If you want to get a feel for it, have a look on YouTube. There’s a few short videos that show bikers and boarders in action.
Media commentators spend most of their time whinging. We do it on your behalf, of course! We’re just doing our bit to make the world a better place! Well, maybe, some of the time…
But every now and again, you have to take your hat off to the good guys. Whoever cajoled and pushed and fought to get the skate park in Bushy Park built has done the state some service. It’s a great idea – and it works.
What struck me was that there should be a far greater emphasis on this kind of positive action by the State and by local government. Why not build fifty of these parks around Dublin? Invest in stock car tracks as well. Give testosterone-fired young fellas an outlet for their energies. And in the same vein, put money into building dressing rooms for the kids who play football all over the city on Sunday morning. Make it a pleasure for people to be involved.
Too much money is wasted on useless shit – who really needs fucking ramps, for Christ’s sake? They have become an endlessly obscene stupidity, sprouting up everywhere and ruining perfectly good roads in the process. It’d be far better to spend the money wasted on them building better sports and leisure facilities, with a bias in favour of youth.
To far too great an extent, the authorities in different guises try to badger, browbeat and bully teenagers and students into doing what they’re told. Into not drinking. Into not doing drugs. Into slowing down. Forget all that negative behaviouralist bollox. Let’s start to think and act positively instead. The skatepark in Terenure is a small step in the right direction. What we need is more of the same and lots of it.
Starting now.