Early morning Malibu slides. Photo: Dylan Gordon
The sand is colder than the water. I contemplate this peculiar fact as I spot a peak going unridden just north of the unoccupied lifeguard tower. I count just a pair of neoprene-clad figures in the water as I wade through the shallows, these members of the dawn patrol not within fifty yards of one another. The peak looks about as inviting as anything can in 58-degree water; as if the ocean is waving me out to come and play. Who am I to refuse the largest body of water on the planet?
Wrapped in a second layer of skin, my frame doesn’t move in quite the same fashion as it normally would. Things feel a bit stiff, as if my limbs are tethered to some massive, mildly-taught rubber band. The bitter water sneaks into my wetsuit through that hole near the knee and by way of a collar that’s just not quite as snug as I thought it was when I’d first battled with it in the surf shop changing room.
It’s a total shock to the system. That’s the best way to describe it. Entire body reverberating in that familiar fashion, my head emerges from the frigid waters as I inhale in gasping fashion, as if the cold has sapped my lungs of their capacity in a single duck dive. It never gets easier, but you learn to love it in a way. After all, it can’t stay August forever.
Out past the break I’m treated to the calm. There’s a serene quality to a sparsely-populated morning, just sitting there bobbing up and down as the smaller sets roll by underneath. Deep breaths assault lungs with briny air, and I feel as if I’m breathing the mist I can see hanging over the coastline to the south. The body begins to warm up a bit, perhaps the pure contentment helping in that regard.
The sky is overcast. Puffy white clouds with bulbous gray outlines are packed tightly together. The ocean mirrors the gray of the sky – dark and foreboding – conjuring visions of monstrous fish lurking in the depths of the seemingly infinite aquatic abyss. Those thoughts creep us less and less as time goes on. I cling to the statistics, cozying up to them like pillows that make me forget I’ve just reinserted myself into the very food chain that man has worked so hard to remove himself from.
After a bit of a lull I spy the first significant bump on the horizon, a gray ripple nearly indistinguishable from the sky beyond it. The ripple begins to rise and take shape, and I know it’s time. A paddle for position, south and out to sea, will find the shoulder. As the climbing wall of water bears down I spin around and stroke with fluidity, totally in control, board slightly angled to the north. Then that unmistakable feeling of the wave’s grasp arrives, allowing me to tag along, transporting myself in more ways than one.
A pop from stomach to feet is done in one seamless motion with icy toes gripping the wax beneath as the craft drives down the face, ahead of the tumult. There lies the epitome of peace, a sense of euphoria unattainable with even the most intoxicating of narcotics. In that moment nothing else in the world exists. I’m along for the ride on the final leg of an odyssey covering thousands of miles. What a way to start the day.
