My wife was a Skingirl

I had my first approach to the Skinhead subculture when I was a teenager since a friend of mine was really into it. 

As I started seeing him more frequently, I also started to get more curious about the Skinhead culture.

 I did some digging and I came to know that, during the late '50s, when the economic boom led to an increase in disposable income, young generations especially started to spend a lot of it on new trends. 

These youngsters were called Mods, from the term Modernist, as Modern Jazz, the music they were devoted to, together with fashion, and scooters.

Around 1966 a schism started to tear them apart, even if many may not agree with it, and, in a way,  two sides of the same coin started to show up.

The peacock mod, dandies, always dressed in the latest most expensive clothes, on one side, and the other mods, sometimes called 'hard mods', sometimes peanuts, recognisable by shorter hair and working-class feel on the other side.

Motivated by social alienation and working-class solidarity, they were commonly identified as Skinheads by 1968.

In addition, the new Skinheads culture was very much into Jamaican Rudeboy styles and background, especially the music: ska, rocksteady, and early reggae (before the tempo slowed down and lyrics became focused on topics like black nationalism and the Rastafari movement).

Still far apart from the far-right turn, they took in the '80.

The topic interested me so much because many aspects of that subculture were very distant from the guy I knew. 

I was attracted and intrigued by how much people need to be part of something, how they dress up, get haircuts, spend money, and listen only to particular music for the feeling of belonging.

The many nights I joined his crew and went to their parties, I was amazed as a young teenager can be. 

They were older than me, could ride scooters obviously, were very wild and unstoppable. 

Their haircuts were short but not shaved.

They all were wearing the same clothes, different brands or colours, but they were all wearing short or long sleeve button-down shirts, v-neck sweaters or tank tops, denim jeans mostly with braces and boots. 

Wouldn't someone like to wear something different? 

I thought about it at that time but couldn't be bothered to ask, now I know that question wasn't even crossing their minds

Riding scooters was the best part.

I loved the Vespas and the Lambrettas, their two strokes, rough reactions, riding together, going any place we wanted. 

The motherly care, the love and attention they were investing into them was unbelievable, almost like an extension of their own families, and as far as I remember, it was back then when my love for the two wheels started. 

The emotions that those little machines could arise detached from everything else, the freedom to ride as long as you wanted, with or without a destination, and the smell of two-stroke oil sticking forever onto your fingers, is something you can't understand riding any other vehicle.

Time passed, and my curiosity for other subcultures, the attraction to study what moves people, took me to other paths. 

Leaving me with a larger understanding of what Skinheads mean, and the big differentiation between them over the years to come, especially after the late 60s.

I have never seen that crew again, since my teenage years in the late 80s. 

Many years have passed, many things have happened.

My wife was a skin girl because we were on similar trails, in the same city, at the same time, running next to each other without knowing it, until it was time for us to share the same one, many years later with many common memories.