LEFT TO RIGHT Forest ollies over the bar and into the bank in Portland, OR. Seamus Foster gets the clip for Forest’s skate-boarding part titled, “Florg,” which is part of the FSBS series on Vimeo. Photo: Jon Stark “I’ve been going to Jackson [WY] since 2004 and when I went with Forest Bailey the snow conditions were bad in the backcountry. He said, ‘Let’s go see what we can find.’ I felt weird about jibbing in Jackson, even though I love street shoots. It just didn’t feel like the culture of Jackson. It’s rad to come to a place like this with someone like Forest, who doesn’t have preconceived notions of what the place is all about. It was cool to have that mind expansion happen in a place that I’ve been to so often. Creeper back three. Note the doorknob on the kicker.” Photo: Tim Zimmerman The Snowboarder’s Journal: Let’s start from the top. Forest Bailey: I was born in a small house in Jamaica, VT. When I was a year old, my parents moved my family to this 12-acre property. The house on it was falling apart and the property was super-over-grown, but rent was only $500 a month. We had space to garden, make art and play. I had a mini-ramp in my backyard. It was an epic place to grow up. When I was 4 or 5 my parents were waiting tables at Stratton Mountain, that’s how I was able to get a pass. They tried to get me to ski first, but I knew I wanted to snowboard. I got into skateboarding around the same time. It was tunnel vision from there on out. What’s your family like? I have two older sisters [Chelsea and Autumn], they’re the best. One of them is two years older than me and in nursing school. The other is six years older than me, she’s an art consultant. My parents are definitely of a more natural background. When every other kid at school had plastic-wrapped everything at lunch, I was always the one with carrot sticks. My dad [Barry] was a full-on snowboard and skateboard dad. We would go to every contest we could around the East Coast. We’d sleep in the car in some parking lot, wake up, do the event and drive home. That was a lot of my childhood. My folks were on [Grateful] Dead tour for many years, so traveling like that felt normal to him. My family life was amazing at times, but a struggle at others. When I was a teenager my parents separated and eventually got di-vorced. My dad met his current partner in Tahoe [CA] and he’s been there for the past 12 years. My mom [Susan] lives in Massachusetts and just got married this summer. Obviously my parents’ relationship didn’t work out, but I’m truly blessed to have been created by them and raised in such a special setting. I love my family so much and wouldn’t want to change anything about my existence. It must’ve been rad living 15 minutes from the mountain. I saw snowboarding from such a cool perspective. When the US Open was happening at Stratton, it was like every pro from around the world coming to my backyard every spring. It sucks there aren’t many events that bring the mainstream of snowboarding to the East Coast anymore. There was such a cool scene back east when I was a kid. If I was born there five years ago rather than 29 years ago, I might not have had the same opportunities. I got sponsored by Stevie Hayes’ little company, Hayes Brothers Snowboards. The factory was only 10 minutes from where I grew up. I was with them for a few years and actually had a pro model when I was 12 or 13, right before the company went out of business. I’d always do super-well in contests and was basically making enough money to support myself since I was 15 years old. By that time, I was always on trips and missing so much school. Red Bull approached me when I was 16 and when I started getting paid from them, I thought maybe it’s time to put everything into snowboarding. I dropped out of school and moved to Lake Tahoe at 17. Zach Leach was the team manager of both Red Bull and Gnu, and that’s how I got on Gnu. I also got on 686 around that same time. 048 THE SNOWBOARDER’S JOURNAL
The Snowboarder's Journal The Snowboarder's Journal 18.4: Page 48
