It’s always worth the paddle out. Photo: Silas Baisch
When I was 20 years old and not yet a surfer, I passed out cold on the beach at Pipeline.
In another life, or another town closer to the ocean, I probably would have been a surfer. As a kid, when we left our woodsy neighborhood and spent whatever time we could afford by the coast, the sea was mostly flat. I biked to the beach with my skim board under one arm, then skated the beach pavilion in the muggy evenings. I witnessed surfers in their natural element, though, slinking around the back of the skate shop, mystifyingly cool with their long hair and flannels, eyes glassy from saltwater. As I hit my teen years I fell hard for the constant motion of soccer and eventually quit skating to play on travel teams.
Fast-forward to the North Shore, somewhere around February 2000. The friend I traveled with — let’s call him J — did surf, and it was he who insisted that our free stopover, on route to studying abroad in Australia, be on Oahu. When the bus groaned to a halt, the waves echoed like fireworks across the Kamehameha Highway. This wasn’t any version of surfing we had seen. Riders wore helmets and carried pieces of broken boards. I snapped pictures on a disposable because cell phones were a nightmare we hadn’t yet dreamed of. At some point, jet lag and free airplane wine buried me in the sand. Later, my skin cruelly torched, we drank from coconuts like the tourists we were.
At my buddy’s insisting, we rented two boards and meekly asked as to where we could paddle out without dying. To add insult to injury, J’s board had an enormous set of dog testicles painted right where he’d put his face. We hitchhiked to what I believe now was Pua’ena Point.
I think J caught a wave or two. I wouldn’t know. I paddled out, saw a wave barreling outside and got psyched out. When I finally went for a wave on the inside, I fell and was sucked to the other side of the break. I clambered out and wandered through the lush undergrowth back to the road, hands shaking.
Weeks later, in Australia, I bought a used shortboard my overconfidence — and J —told me I could ride. The first time we paddled out, I watched as a local landed a backflip cleanly, floppy hat still in place. That’s a surfer, I thought.
I struggled every time we surfed in Perth, riding the tides of intimidation and imposter syndrome. I’ll never forget when, after “surfing” a crowded breach break, a girl in our class yelled, “God, did you even get one wave?” I began thinking that surfing wasn’t for me. I joined a soccer team and backpacked around, once sleeping on the beach to be awoken by a tribe of quokkas licking my face. With the help of some Aussie mates, I bought a deck and remembered the rush of adrenaline when swooping up a bowl for a grind or rock’n’roll.
Months later, in Byron Bay with a new girlfriend, I rented a dented egg and scored three waves out of 103 attempts. We rolled a joint and ate steaming French fries on the beach while hippies juggled torches in the darkness. The relationship blew up, but I’ll never forget standing tall on those warm, curling waves, the red sun lighting my way. I still wasn’t a surfer, but in the following years, I recognized the cachet that comes with being one. I’m sure that at some point I informed an uninterested woman at a dive bar that “oh, yeah. I totally surf.”
Things do get better. Photo: Tim Marshall
Years later, I supported my snowboarding habit out West on an eight-dollar-an-hour salary, then ended up back in New England. I began joining my friends for freezing sessions around Massachusetts. I was typically the greenest of the group, and I never had money for a board, so I borrowed a friend’s waterlogged 7’8″ — the deal was I had to put it back in his kitchen exactly where it had decoratively leaned. One chilly day on the Cape, no one noticed that I got stuffed deep into the icy depths and held down far longer than my pay grade. I ended up puking and coughing on the beach. Surfing wasn’t sweeping me off my feet — but the stoke of my friends meant something.
Surfing routinely knocked me down, actually, but I learned to admire its power and get back up. During a hurricane swell in Maine, I watched my friends each neatly take a wave in as the size picked up and a crowd gathered. When I tried to follow them, my wave tossed me like a cork against the rocks. A buddy helped me clamber up the slick stone, board broken, ego smashed. Other sessions were more inspiring. I took off on a frozen wave in Nahant, Mass. as a buddy hooted, making the drop and holding on for my life, forgetting the ache in my frozen hands (my gloves were full of holes).
Now, I live in California and surf daily, and when we move back East, I’ll pull the winter rubber on and try do the same. Waxing my board in the blue morning light, I often think about when I was trying to teach myself to surf in Rhode Island when I was 18 or so, heard a “cool” kid in the lineup make fun of me (with my temper, I’m shocked I didn’t chuck seaweed at the guy; I was probably just trying to survive). I remember how when a friend came back from the Army, the first thing we did was paddle out together, still mostly clueless. I reflect on finding myself surfing next to the legendary Peter Pan years later at the same break, trying unsuccessfully to emulate his timeless style.
We all come to surfing differently. Regardless, we understand the work that it takes. More importantly, surfing now means something to me. Honestly, it means everything. Surfing is my companion as I stand in the dark kitchen with the dog at my feet, digging the coffee maker’s growl and the wave reports. It’s friends, community, energy, obsession, and at my age, injuries and sacrifice. Surfing is motivation on a big day when I get caught inside and surrealistic magic on an empty Tuesday morning with sets lined up and dolphins trading rides. Surfing is the board I bought in Perth all those years ago, dingy yellow and hanging proudly on our wall.
I’ll relive the tougher moments as I also recall moments like this past fall, when I got swallowed up by a towering curl that suddenly kicked me out in a curtain of spray, smiling in disbelief.
I paddled back and turned to the stoic dude who’d been on my left. “I didn’t cut you off, did I?” I ventured.
“Nah, we split it.” He raised a fist. “That was sick.”
We talked for a minute about our rides and agreed we could leave the beach at that moment and our day would be fully made.
Then we each paddled in a different direction, in search of whatever would come next.
