The Bridge of Mystery

As a child growing up in a lower middle class neighborhood, I never was inside my house. I did have a Nintendo but I'd much rather be out playing street hockey, throwing around the football, or even going to the park to play a game of baseball. Overall, my favorite activity was to go was the park, but not because of the massive jungle gym or the five seat swing set. Across the road seperating the park from the railroad tracks was a dark and dingy bridge that any curious 13 year old would love to explore. It was enormous due to the fact that it passed over the New River canal, a very important waterway in Fort Lauderdale. I had always heard stories of what goes on underneath the bridge, whether it be a hotspot for gang shootouts, drug dealing or using, or even a far fetched tale of a wolf that gaurded it. "If I ever find out about you goin' under that bridge, you wont be able to sit for a week!" my mother would exclaim. When do kids ever listen to their parents?

I believe I was around twelve or thirteen when I finally got the guts to go under the bridge. I was edgy, nervous, but most filled with anxious excitement. I convinced my best friend at the time, Robert, to steal his dad's taser and bring it, just incase we ran into any trouble. He obliged and we set off on our adventure into the unknown. We got to the park and Robert began to have second thoughts. He stopped, turned to me and said, "What if the stories are true! You know they found dead bodies under there right??" I turned to him an exclaimed, "Stop being a pansy, Rob! Everything is cool, besides no one is going to mess with two little kids." Frankly, I wouldn't have gone in there alone. We make our way across the tracks, and start walking towards the river. There was barbed wire fence that ran along the side of the bridge, a mere attempt to stop anyone from tresspassing. I had heard of a small hole that was cut out about halfway to the river. Rob, shaking nervously blurted, "Man, I'm scared. What if we get killed?!" I ignored him because I had spotted it, the hole in the fence blocking us from the unknown excitement that awaited. I didn't say a word, I just knelt down and went through. Robert followed, taser in hand.

The place was a ghostland. No gangs, no druggies, and most importantly no wolf. It was amazing, fifty or sixty support columns that towered 60 feet up, completely covered in graffiti. This amazed me. I had never seen anything so raw and filthy yet beautiful at the same time. I stood dumbfounded about what all of this meant. I thought it was all gang related work. Robert had seen enough, it was nothing special to him, but to me, I was about to enter a world I never knew existed. As I was walking home after helping Robert return his dad's taser, it stirred in my mind what this all meant. I immeadiately went on the computer and typed in "ft. lauderdale graffiti" to a search engine. I browsed through a couple articles about the police cracking down on vandals but then came across a website called "Vandalized". It was a site dedicated for sharing pictures and thoughts on graffiti in the South Florida area. I began to type in names I had remembered from under the bridge. Hundreds of pictures came up, even more beautiful than under the bridge. I was hooked, I had found my calling.

The bridge was no longer a taboo. I loved it. I would spend hours underneath it, taking pictures, sketching letters, and studying every peice until I had every letter structure and color scheme memorized. The day had come, after robbing a few of my neighbor's sheds for spare spraypaint cans, I attempted my first peice. It came out horrid. I soon realized this art of graffiti was not as easy as catching a football or riding a bike, this was going to take practice and lots of it. One day, I was under the bridge sitting on the rocky ground just staring at a peice that had been done by an artist named "Rek", sometimes spelled "Wrek." He was one of the kings of Fort Lauderdale, everywhere I went I saw his name. Light poles, street signs, curbs, bus benches, businesses, even the occasional bilboard. He was my hero. "Hey kid." I nearly defecated my pants. Turning around thinking I was about to get offered crack or get my ass kicked, I saw a tall, lanky, yet dominating man, or as I later learned, teenager. "You like what you see?" he said, pointing to the peice on the column. "Uh y-y-yeah, Rek, man.. He runs this place. I love his sh*t!" I exclaimed. "Thanks kid, you write?" he responded, calm as can be. "Well, I'm trying to learn. I found out about graff about a year ago and I've been sketching and practicing down here." I said, trying to maintain a steady composure. "Oh so you're the new jack, Label, huh?" he questioned. "Umm, well wait are you a cop?" I said, not really knowing what to think. "F**k no, n****. I'm Rek." he said in a proud voice. I was stunned. My hero standing right in front of me. We talked for a bit and agreed on coming down to the bridge once a week and he would show me some techniques. He gave me his cell number and said call him if I wanted to go paint one night. I had become my mentor, a key factor in becoming a writer.

Ever since I met Rek, whose real name is Bryon, I have met so many more people that grew up like me, think like me, and more importantly share my interests. The graffiti community is a tight nit group of people ranging from teens to mid forty year olds who mostly communticate over the internet. My best friend is actually a graffiti writer, and we have grown so close I consider him my brother. Graffiti helps me express myself without drugs or alcohol, although sometimes I do create so pretty great works of art under the influence. It has helped me get through rough points in my life, shaped myself as a person, and given me a unique social style. I think about it more than I think about anything else. To me it is more than a hobby, it is my life and I will never stop.