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A tribute to a fallen hero
Special to Page 2

Editor's Note: When we got to work today, we found another e-mail from that bartending, skateboarding buddy of ours in California. We decided to pass it along again. A word of warning: always wear a helmet.

Chapter Four
... in which our hero honors a fallen compatriot.

I work in a bar, here at Lore's. But that doesn't mean I drink.

I swore off alcohol when I was 12. It hurt my focus when I was going for it on my street luge, or skateboarding, or, best of all, videotaping my friends who do. The extreme life is sharp and sweet, not blurry. It's a shame to miss any of it.

The last few days, though, focusing on anything has been a challenge.

I screwed things up with my first customer tonight. He sat down and ordered a beer. When he ordered a second, I cleared his first glass away and the coaster under it stuck to the bottom of the glass as I was lifting it and fell off right onto the customer's pants, leaving a wet crescent.

Luckily, he was distracted by something he was watching on one of the 25 TV monitors we have here in the sports bar. It was one of those NFL Films shows. He couldn't keep his eyes off a balding guy in a wildy colored sweater.

"Steve is something, isn't he?" the man turned to ask me. He was referring to the show's narrator, the head of NFL Films, Steve Sabol. It turned out he didn't just think Steve Sabol was a genius, he actually worked for the guy. .

"You actually know Steve Sabol?" I said. "The Steve Sabol?"

"I see you know something about film," the man said, introducing himself as Chris.

I explained that videotaping sports, especially wearing a helmetcam, is a favorite thing of mine.

"Well, it's not just a fun hobby for Steve," he said, as if I had just amused him. "Steve Sabol runs an operation that makes Universal and Sony and Paramount and all the rest of them peanuts. Steve Sabol is the greatest filmmaker this planet has ever seen."

I said that sounded right to me. And I told him that maybe Steve could do something about what had gotten me so un-focused this week, maybe why I'd let that wet coaster fall on his expensive pants.

"Listen up, Wheeler," he said. "Every second of every day, Steve Sabol is on a TV screen somewhere around the world. He's like Lucille Ball. Now, even if I could get through to Steve Sabol, as terribly important and busy a man as he is, why should he want to hear what you have to say?"

"I just thought he'd want to know about Ray Huffman," I said.

"Never heard of him," Chris said, "and something tells me it's safe to say Mr. Sabol hasn't either."

"Well, maybe that's because Ray was only 17," I said. "But Ray Huffman was a filmmaker, just like Mr. Sabol, only Ray shot video. That's what he was shooting when he died."

I explained that Ray was a senior in high school. He was making a video of his friends skateboarding. Putting it all together for a drama project called "Skateboard Survivor," which, come to think of it, sounds a whole lot more interesting to me than "Football's Legendary Long Snappers," which is the kind of stuff I see Sabol's name attached to a lot lately.

Anyway, I said to Chris that Ray's grandfather told a newspaper reporter his grandson had never run with gangs or been in trouble. All Ray liked doing was skateboarding, doing jumps and flips and making the most extreme videos he could. I told him that just last week, Ray was videotaping when a neighbor, some guy in his 40s, a guy who didn't like the noise or them coming close to his car or whatever, rushed out into the street with a rifle and shot Ray Huffman dead.

"What's Steve Sabol supposed to do about that?" Chris wanted to know.

"I thought maybe a scholarship fund," I said. "Or name some new sports film-making competition in Ray Huffman's honor."

Sometimes people like Ray Huffman and me get extremely messed with by people who let's just say don't have much appreciation for sports or art. A really established sports filmmaker like Steve Sabol must get physically threatened all the time.

Chris just looked at me like I was nuts, slapped some money on the bar and walked away.

My friend Puker watched the guy from NFL Films go and then picked up one of the twenties he'd left. "Wheeler, this looks like a night when you should buy yourself a shot of whiskey," he said.

No doubt. But I told Puker I was determined to stay alcohol-free and, besides, I knew a better way to use the money. "Gas. The papers said Ray Huffman lived in Lomita. This'll buy us a full tank down to San Diego and back. We'll drive all night. We'll buy a candle for the sidewalk."

Puker nodded. He understood. Down to the bone.

Ray Huffman liked skateboarding and shooting video. But that didn't make him a bad kid.



	ALSO SEE: Wheeler's X-Cellent Adventures: Chapter 3 Wheeler's X-Cellent Adventures: Chapter 2 Wheeler's X-Cellent Adventures: Chapter 1