Adventure line management at the home mountain formerly known as Hyak, WA, in 2015. Photo: Tim Zimmerman PAUL FERREL AND ITCHY LIFE When we were in our early 20s, Mike and I hired our friend, snowboard/skateboard shredder Paul Ferrel, as our first Mervin employee. He has been with us ever since and done some amaz-ing things, including winning the Mt. Baker Legendary Banked Slalom Pro Men’s division and introducing us to Jamie Lynn. He currently runs the product design and production for our BMBW binding program and a host of other projects. In those early days, we had metal templates we cut our fiber-glass out of using a utility knife. Paul was a materials prep guy, so one of his jobs was to cut glass for the next day’s lay-up. It was one of our least favorite jobs because you got tons of itchy, furry fiberglass on everything you were wearing. I let Paul live in the back room of a small lakeside basement spot I was renting to help him keep his expenses down — none of us were making much money at the time — and we used to com-mute to work together. Mike and I were meticulous about being clean — not getting resin or fiberglass on us and having special work gear and shoes that we didn’t wear home — but Paul wasn’t as concerned as we were. One fall morning, Paul got up and put his unbelievably fiber-glass-covered kit on from the day before. He was making toast and I went to the bathroom and started getting my shit together for the day and came back out. Meanwhile, Paul decided to crawl into my bed and get cozy under the covers in his sparkly, practically shimmering, completely fiberglass-covered pants and sweatshirt. For me, an experienced “abrasive technician” who spent every day in the shop building boards, who did not want itchy at home — that was as big a personal space violation as you could get. He had his classic, shit-eating-rascal-little-brother grin on his face when I called him out for the offense, and he left a trail of sparkles every-where behind him. Board building wasn’t a job, it was itchy life. At this point, almost 40 years in, why wouldn’t you just cash out and go surfing? We love board building. I mean, I kind of want to cash out and go surf-ing for like a week or two [laughs]. But I find this business grounding. Part of it might be mental health. This is what we know, this is what we do, this is what feels good. We do it and we keep doing it and we’ve been able to avoid getting normal jobs, but in the end, we work twice as hard to avoid that. I think Mike feels the same way. He could bail out and go surfing. I think his wife might want him to. But Mike can’t do his job from Mexico. It’s like being an author or a photographer or an artist. You do it ’cause you love it. You’re 58 now and you’re super-active—surfing, skating, snowboarding, mountain biking. Do you feel like a certain amount of that stoke comes from the fact that you’re grinding away trying to make better tools for these activities? I’ll go snowboarding or surfing no matter what, but it’s always more fun to go up and ride something new, which you made. And if you do get a breakthrough, that’s always fun to share with the masses, and it’s excit-ing. Mike and I were in the factory today looking at this new construc-tion we made for Travis Rice’s board going, “That might be the sickest thing we’ve ever made.” PETE SAARI 083
The Snowboarder's Journal The Snowboarder's Journal 20.4: Page 83
