You Don't Know Unless You Go (or, Sometimes You Get Lucky): Be Surf

I actually love small days. Clean, 1-3 feet days are truly my favorite conditions. I love a big day, I love to push it just a bit—toe the line—but I really really love small days.

The forecast suggested going later in the day today was the thing to do but I got overcome with excitement and couldn’t not go this morning. Ten minutes later, I found myself driving north, Billie Eilish on Spotify. My wetsuit was still wet as were my booties because we haven’t set up “the most amazing Christmas present in the entire Universe” that Nick made for me (a mits/booties/Wet Sox custom-made rack *he made it*), and I knew it would be cold but I didn’t care!

I got so excited passing Stage Neck—if you peek down, you can size up the waves, and we had lines. I knew it would be small and clean—and likely very quiet given these are conditions a lot of people won’t get out of bed for.

I parked, suited up, ran to the shore, where a little grom was paddling over to the spot I was running towards. It was glassy and super low wind when I got there but within a half hour or so, the wind picked up. We still had waves rockin’ through but two hours in, they were starting to crumble with the high wind. Freezing and losing mobility in my feet and hands, I got out a couple hours in but was stoked because the wind was strong all day long, even through when it was supposed to drop off. I was so happy I had gone out in the AM, so happy the Wave Jiminy Cricket had whispered in my ear, filled me with stoke and sent me up north.

You can (and I do) look at surf reports all day but to really know you just have to go, and sometimes you get lucky. Sometimes the forecast is off and so whatever lightning struck you to go early or later, was some sort of magical divining rod giving you the intergalactic cosmic wave report. And the apps love to say 1-2 feet but there are always bigger sets that roll through if you’re patient and willing. Happy happy day.

Waves are the Recipe: Be Surf

I can feel it on a cellular level when I need the ocean.

“Salt water heals,” my buddy Ollie said this summer. Age nine, budding surfer, she gets it.

I met Maddie at the beach today. She was soaking up as much heat as possible in the car, having been out for hours already. “It’s more fun than it looks,” she said. “Promise.”

And it was. 1-2 feet with random sets skewing on the 2+ sets and just plain CLEAN. No wind, sun was out in full force for the most part, and very few people out.

We started near Rest’s but the current sneakily pulled us north until we were nearly on top of B.H. It was ok. It was good.

The water. It really feels like the Source for me. It IS the source for me. It wipes everything clean, it refills the well, it does all the things that water does so well.

My mind is constantly whirring, like so many people’s, but when you’re surfing, even on a small day, you’re just looking at the waves, assessing, wondering “Will it go?”, wondering “Am I too far in?” wondering “Is this going to toss me?” These visceral in the moment thoughts crowd out those Dark Wolf thoughts that love to roam and lope and tear things up.

Waves are the recipe. Waves force you to be in the present. So all those questions, and then the paddle, and then you’re up and all you’re doing is riding the face and trying to throw something maybe, or just trying to wedge in and chill, and then some sort of energy geyser erupts and you’re just thinking “Weeeeeeeee!” Suddenly Dark Wolf is gone and you’re free.

Saturday's Surf Sesh. Two words: AARon BrrrRRRR.

Newsflash: It wasn’t even that cold!

I met Maddie and her buddy Lou at LS at 9:30am yesterday. Absolutely NO wind and sun was shining. Temps read 20 something Fahrenheit and I’m not sure if it was the standing around a bit, the wet Wet Sox I’d put on at home or the fact that Google had lodged a nut in my head in the morning: The weather is 11 degrees but it feels like 2. Have nice day! that set me shivering early on.

I hadn’t been out in a couple weeks and so the already brutal paddle out felt heavier, and I felt slower. The currents were incredibly strong and sometimes I was paddling sideways. I did everything I could to avoid turtle rolling but that’s always a fools errand and lasted about five minutes. There was SO much water. We’d gotten a storm early this week and I think it just pushed a ton into the ocean.

After twenty minutes or so, I finally got through to the other side, not before I realized I’d been pulled a quarter mile down, toward Restaurants. Shit, I thought.

I made my way back to Maddie. The waves were big with surprisingly little push, meaning you had to commit to sitting right under the lip essentially to nab one. I was having trouble hanging with this and the waves were breaking inconsistently, and also often double waves, which was even more confusing.

Not going to lie.

It was a frustrating session for me.

I hate admitting that. I try to make surfing a place in my life that has no pressure to perform, to be anything other than what it is, but I really wanted to snag some waves yesterday and it just wasn’t my day. I was dropping too fast down the face when I caught them, I was NOT catching them because I was resisting how far in I had to be and then two hours in I was slipping from cold feet and just face planting right into the water.

It’s true that I was out with buds, the sun was shining, we were bobbing in the ocean. Overall, we were winning.

But I walked back out onto the shore thinking: I can’t go this long without being in the water again.

I thought about it as I drove home in my wetsuit (changing was not happening) and as I stood in the hot water of the shower and I recommitted to surfing. It quite literally is one of the sources of my power in my life and I need to be tapped in to it more. It’s my church.

YEW for silver linings.