Grant's Story
A punk-skater kid, Grant Finkelson was independent, creative, beyond intelligent, and wildly ambitious. He wanted to make music, he wanted to make art, he wanted to travel and live in places he'd never been, he wanted to meet new people, he wanted to learn new things, he wanted to make money, he wanted to change the world, and he wanted to skateboard as much as he could.
Grant's independence made him think he was capable of dealing with his addiction and mental health issues on his own. He never wanted to put his burdens on anyone he loved, so he made it his mission to help himself. He was just a kid when he was prescribed a painkiller for a broken foot that would ultimately show him there was a medicine out there that could help you feel "better." He was too young to know what world of addiction he had entered and the power these drugs would have over his psyche.
He didn't want the people he loved to worry about him, and he was too young to understand the problem he was hosting in his body. After many years of trying to find quick-fix opioids to heal, he found Kratom and thought he was on his road to healing and self-discovery. Unfortunately, he miscalculated the risk associated with Kratom, and his extensive use of it to replace his opiate cravings took his young, precious life.
One thing that was Grant's saving grace, outside of drugs, was skateboarding. He and his cousins had their boards at a young age and learned all the tricks together. While they each became masters at the sport in their way, Grant took the cake in terms of really owning what it meant to be able to skate like a pro. He was a multi-talented kid who could do anything he put his mind to, but skateboarding was his passion, therapy, and life. No matter where he was, he always found time to grab his board and skate it out.
He was so passionate about how skateboarding truly was his life-saver that he was adamant about passing it on to others. He spent time with other skaters, taught his family and friends how to skate, and even went as far as going to a city council meeting in his hometown to start a conversation about getting a skatepark built in his small Minnesota town. Unfortunately, his life ended before he could keep the conversation going.
