Is skateboarding a crime?

One morning the bell on the front gate rings and one of neighbors, a policewoman, is standing there in full uniform. She hands me this piece of paper and tells me that I must call to speak with the police in the next village over about Sebastian and skateboarding.

Sebastian has been really into skateboarding this summer and spending hours every day at a local skatepark with friends. What could possibly go wrong?

I couldn’t make the call until the afternoon as I wanted all of us to do it together, having no idea what we were in for. It seemed to be a good idea to have Donella for her Italian, John for father-figure moral support, and Sebastian, so he could atone for his clearly numerous, although not yet disclosed, sins. I had a significant knot in my stomach all morning.

The moment to make the call comes and we all stand around the kitchen table with the phone on speaker. You can feel the tension. We make the call and it rings. This perfectly nice woman answers and says she’s so glad we called. That she’s a mom and a friend of our neighbor and just wanted to say that our son and his friends have been seen a couple of times skating outside the park—on roads and the main corso, or pedestrian street of the medieval town—which is dangerous and not allowed. She also thought that one of the group was a bit too old to be hanging out with them and just wanted me to know all of this. As one mom to another. Then she wished us a great day.