Skateboarder Sean Mortimer’s son came home from school and asked, “Am I weird?”
Mortimer gave his son an enthusiastic response, “Yes!
“But then I thought about myself and my experience and how it’s actually not a great feeling at first,” Mortimer said during a recent interview. “He’s young, so he doesn’t quite realize how awesome that can be yet.”
Mortimer said he’s never really known what normal is. He’d often watched as people around him seemed to navigate the world effortlessly. He felt as if everyone else had a study guide for navigating everyday life.
In his latest book, “Misfit: A Survival Guide,” Mortimer calls on cultural disrupters, such as Devo cofounder and lead singer, Mark Mothersbaugh; world championship skateboarder and filmmaker Stacy Peralta; and artist, photographer and street skater Ed Templeton to get their perspectives, stories and guidance on how they turned their weirdness into a compass for success.
The book, which is in stores Jan. 20, features an introduction by fellow skater and friend Tony Hawk. “Misfit: A Survival Guide” encourages readers to think critically about their desire to conform and to take a path less traveled by digging deep within themselves to trace the roots of their authentic, unconventional selves, survival guide-style.
“I really wanted people like my son to know that it might be painful right now, where you might be at this part of the journey, but it can end in this awesome place where you are so grateful for all of your imperfections,” Mortimer said. “I hang out with these people, and some of them are celebrated for being unconventional and unique. So I wanted to explore how we all got to this point where we’re grateful for not settling. We’re grateful for those feelings that made us feel marginalized or outside the norm.”
Initially, when Mortimer had the idea for the book, he planned to fill it with anecdotes from his misfit friends. Once seen as obstacles, these differences later became a vital part of their success. However, after speaking with his agent, he was encouraged to add more personal flair.
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While Mortimer’s passion is skating, he understands that misfits come from all walks of life. He said it really clicked for him when he spoke with publisher, writer, musician, and documentarian Sacha Jenkins, who described his observations of the youth culture thriving in New York City, his hometown.
Jenkins was at the forefront of the hardcore punk and hip-hop scenes that existed side by side. Both genres, although parts of American counterculture, seem far from having anything in common, but Mortimer said Sacha could see that their respective fans were actually cut from the same misfit cloth, whether they realized it or not. Both groups of kids were finding community outside mainstream culture and music.
“It was really rad to talk to him about that because he opened my eyes to that specific perspective,” he said. “There are so many ways to connect. This book also really opened my eyes to how misfits can connect in different ways and how they fit in with each other.”
For social beings, humans require connection and community. While misfits may not feel they fit in anywhere in a cookie-cutter society, there are spaces that welcome different and unscripted ways of being. In the book, there is a section called “United by Dysfunction” that includes a chapter in which Mortimer likens conformity to Superman’s world and the land of misfits to Bizarro World, a fictional land in the DC comics where everything is the opposite and backwards from Earth.
Mortimer said that this alternate version of reality may seem imperfect on the outside, but on the inside, they do belong, in the same way misfits do when they find their passions and communities, whether that be skating, art, music, or anything else. In these worlds, misfits set the rules.
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“Because so many of these people are in the same situation where they don’t fit in, they’re creating their own value system,” he said.
However, creating something new can still be frowned upon in spaces meant to welcome creativity and push boundaries. An example of this is when graffiti artist Shepard Fairey entered the street art scene; other artists weren’t so welcoming, which took it in a different direction than more traditional forms at the time.
He also mentioned Hawk, who was skinnier than most skaters in his early days and had to figure out how to generate enough weight to perform an ollie with a late grab. When he did, many skaters said he was cheating or doing it wrong. Then there is the co-opting of the punk rock movement, created as an underground DIY movement to challenge mainstream culture, but later embraced by it.
“It’s not like this misfit zone is some sort of utopia,” Mortimer said. “It falls into the same problems that every aspect of society does. That stuff comes naturally, but it can still thrive when new people come in and break those norms again and make it valuable again.”
The book’s final chapters include one on parenting, which circles back to Mortimer’s son’s question that helped inspire this survival guide for those outside the norm. Part of the reason he included the chapter is that he wanted to give parents additional perspectives on how to support their kids who may not fit the mold, while recognizing that it could be a difficult tension not to intervene on the side of conformity and to show the benefits of giving a kid space to embrace a different path.
“A lot of the audience for this book may be people who might not have embraced that Bizzaro World so much, but maybe have a kid that they love and want to give them their best life,” he said. “I hope they can find a way to be true to that and grateful for it instead of wondering why their kids were born this way and hope that they lean into it rather than fight it.”
“Misfit: A Survival Guide” panel with Sean Mortimer and Tony Hawk
When: 6 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 20.
Where: Camino Books: For The Road Ahead, 1555 Camino Del Mar, Suite 114, Del Mar.
Admission: Limited reserved seating is available to those who purchase a copy of the book for $29 at caminobks.com.
Also: Sean Mortimer and Michelle Steilen. “Misfit: A Survival Guide.” 7 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 28. Book Soup 8818 W. Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood. 34.74 at eventbrite.com.