Summer of 1992, my two best friends and I liked to pass our late nights by driving around Bainbridge Island, then a sub-rural community beginning its transformation into its current upper-middle class suburban state. Like bored teenagers driving around hometowns everywhere, we were looking for trouble…but in our case it was plastic trouble.

We were looking for big wheels.

None of us drank and two of us were virgins, so we had to get our thrills where we could. 3:30 on Sunday mornings, we would cruise the wealthy newly-developed neighborhoods scanning dewy lawns for glistening big wheels left out by rich children who hadn’t put them away come sunset. When we hit the jackpot, the car would silently roll to a stop, one of us would silently jump out, and the big wheel would be confiscated.

No eruptions of teenage giggles would ensue until we were safely back in the car and several blocks away. We knew when to be quiet.

Once we’d accumulated three big wheels, we would drive to the steepest, longest hill we could find. Typically, it was Arrow Point, near Battle Point Park. We’d hide whoever’s car we happened to be driving and take our big wheels to the top of the hill.

Then we’d head down the hill on our stolen plastic contraband.

Riding a big wheel is no small feat when you’re 17 trying to fit into a seat designed for a 6 year old. The plastic seats would sag beneath our asses, and putting your feet on the pedals (and therefore brakes) was not an option. Knees can’t bend like that. My two companions always opted to ride the hills with their legs sticking straight out on either side of the front wheel. This was probably smart as they could use their feet to brake.

I, meanwhile, preferred to prop my legs up over the steering wheel. This granted me no braking control, but allowed for a less awkward, more kamikaze, experience.

We would scream down the hill, the sound of over-burdened plastic against concrete in our ears, the rush of night air on our faces. It was very exciting in that “don’t drink, don’t smoke, what do you do?” sort of way.

One weekend night, as we were in a mid-hill decent, a car crested the hill in the front of us. “Ditch!” came up the battle cry, and all three of us steered toward the ditch at the side of the road. Since the other two could use their feet to brake, they had smooth transitions from downhill to ditch. I, meanwhile, steered to sharply to the right, and wiped out on the asphalt…effectively wiping off the top several layers of skin from my right forearm.

I made it into the ditch anyway. We liked to think the cars never saw us, but I’m sure there were late night Island drivers wondering what the HELL those three girls were doing in the ditch at this time of night. Whatever. I was bleeding and pissed off and had cracked the axle of my big wheel. This meant we would have to hunt for a replacement next weekend, instead of just enjoying our night-rides.

The road rash on my arm healed pretty well. It turned into a vast field of scab.

A couple weeks after my accident, I headed to Lollapalooza with Susannah. We weren’t big grunge fans, but we were high school girls with a huge rock festival happening at the county fairgrounds where we used to show our rabbits as part of 4H, so we had to go…just for the irony of it, really.

Naturally, when Soundgarden came onto the main stage, I did what every good 17 year old girl wearing flannel and cut-offs was supposed to do: I went into the enormous mosh pit.

It was dusty-sweaty and hot and exciting and rough and all the things that mosh pits were supposed to be. I jostled around and laughed and tried to keep from get getting knocked over. I didn’t know any of the songs playing, so I couldn’t really sing along. If I’d been trying harder I could have been a poser, but realistically I was just there … having as much fun as I could.

After the set ended, the mosh throng loosened up, and I squeezed my way out to go get some lemonade and meet back up with Susannah.

Once out of the crowd, I straighten my shirt and hair and noticed my arm.

Where my expansive brittle scab had been, now was just smooth pink skin. Not a single crust or hint of scabacious material remained. I poked my arm. It wasn’t tender or painful in the least.

I slowly realized that all the sweat and friction from the mosh pit had effectively eased the scab, piece by piece, right off my skin. A sense of foul accomplishment spread through me as I realized that every person who’d slammed against me, every sweating concert-goer who’d jostled up next to that innocent looking 17 year old girl that was me, every single one of them had taken away a little gift. They’d one by one transferred my scab to their skin or clothing.

And THAT was disgusting.

And THAT was hard-fucking-core.