Photograph by David Walter Banks
Atlantan is a first-person account from a familiar stranger who makes the city tick. This month’s is from Kevin Randolph.
I’m 60 years old, from Chicago. Sixty sounds so old. I don’t feel it at all. I moved here in 1997 and got a house in Old Fourth Ward about 10 years ago.
I was a half-marathoner. I have bad knees, so I can’t run anymore, but I can Rollerblade for days. I had to find something to occupy my time when my knees got messed up. I used to skate with a group on weekends in Midtown. After all the building in 2014, Atlanta got congested, and it became dangerous to Rollerblade in the streets. It wasn’t until Covid that I started singing—when I noticed how depressed and scared people were.
Now, I sing while I skate. I get to have fun. People come up to me and give me hugs. They tell me they saw me singing “Party in the U.S.A.” and can’t help but smile and laugh. I sing “Apple Bottom Jeans” [“Low”], “Hollaback Girl,” and “I Can’t Make You Love Me.” It’s an eclectic mixture.
I’m on the Beltline pretty much every day, doing 12 to 20 miles. On Saturdays, when it’s nice out, I skate for hours. I go from Piedmont Park to DeKalb Avenue (by Shake Shack) and then turn around. Occasionally, I go down to Madison Yards. I try to get out there when people are out. I’m ADHD, so I get bored easily. I need people to feed off.
I wear big headphones with plastic bags on them. I know it looks strange; I don’t care. I sweat profusely. I’m drenched by the time I finish skating. There was a kid who won first place at a Halloween party by dressing as me. On the weekends, I get strange looks from tourists and people who have never seen me. I just smile and laugh. After a while, their guard goes down. One time, a lady bought me a pizza. Someone gave me $100 and a card last Christmas and said, “Thank you for being nice.”
Most people don’t know that I’m overeducated. My undergrad is in computer science, with a minor in ballet. I have a master’s in math. I taught advanced electrical courses on submarines in the Navy, and English and Spanish in middle schools. I got my real estate license because I got bored. I used to be a gymnast, and I sang in a gay men’s choir, performing at weddings, funerals, and church. Now I just sing on the Beltline.
This article appears in our November 2024 issue.
