CHASING MAVERICKS PART 3: BACKGROUND

It’s not easy being a background player. You turn up first, leave last and get paid peanuts. If it is a big crowd day and there is a bunch of you, you get given cheap bad snacks and a lame lunch. And if you were in a teenager working with us on Mavericks you basically had to wear your Mum’s old clothes. I felt for every poor shy teenager as we dressed her in our early 90’s finest and her Mum fell on the floor screeching “Omigod, I used to look just like that!” it happened a lot in Santa Cruz and quite a few young ladies were mortified as they shuffled around in their straight leg 501’s. Some of the hipper kids got into the spirit and contributed with their Urban Outfitters redux, and once we banned the skinny jeans and added in some stretchy headbands it worked out pretty good. The boys were cool with the baggy Dickies and old school chucks and only slightly balked at wearing an adjustable baseball cap. The really cool kids freaked out over the vintage Stussy (boys) and baggy dungaree shorts (girls) with lace up Doc Martens. Every once in a while I took a few shots with the old iPhone. I knew we hit pay dirt when one of the local grips came up with tears in his eyes and pointed to a girl we “created” and whispered, “She looks just like my high school sweetheart….”