Surfing Dawn Patrol Makes You a Crazy Joyful Ninja

Joy makes you a ninja.

Joy lights you up so darkness bounces off you like a tennis ball the rest of the day.

On winter mornings where I drag my ass out of bed, the blue of nautical twilight in the sky, wriggle into 6mm of rubber and make my way north to the beach, I am, essentially, driving to a session of Joy.

I park and I’m moving as fast as I can without forgetting things (I inevitably leave my wax on the back windshield wiper where I’ve stored it so I don’t have to reopen the car and then I arrive home after my seshie shocked and grateful that it’s still there). I’m moving so fast that I always wonder, Where did I stow my key? as I’m running towards the water. There’s no turning back to check, it’s too cold, I’ve got to work in an hour, and there are waves.

I’m running. Running so fast that I will likely trip on my leash and stagger or possibly fall but I don’t care because…there are waves.

And then I’m in the water. When there’s a break, I’m paddling for a spot beyond the break. And then I’m there, bobbing, watching the pink yolk of the sun rise from the horizon. Maybe I’m with Maddie or maybe it’s just me, the rest of the world asleep.

And then, a wave’s coming. It’s rising—is there enough push? Am I in the right spot? Gotta go!—and I’m paddling and it’s got me, and I’m popping up and riding the face or just cruising if it’s a wicked small day. Then I’m off, and inside, it’s church bells and holyrollin’ choirs, fireworks and confetti. It’s joy joy joy. It’s the doing of the thing I’m fashioned to do, the practice and the act. The ritual and the time that has brought me to this point. It’s the simple act of harnessing energy and being with nature, riding what she has given us, being one with that wave.

This feeling—this lit up, boogie woogie feeling—is with me all day. It’s got my shoulders higher. It’s got my voice all chirping like. It’s got me smiling and dancing and thinking, Whatevs! When life doesn’t go my way or when my coworker asks me an annoying question. It’s a suit of armor for whatever nonsense might come up.

It is JOY that comes from PLAY and the thing I love to do.

Maddie and I often find ourselves shouting, “IT’S JUST SO FUN!” when we’re out on the water.

Epiphany: FUN and joy: Not just for kids.

Fun and JOY is for you and for me!

Cerrando Circulos: On Old Chapters Closing, New Chapters Opening

Yesterday was my final day at work at Boston University, where I’ve been working since May 2013.

I got to campus early and headed to Life Alive to have some coffee and finish up a couple thank you notes I had yet to write for my team. And as I was sitting there at the bar, waiting for my coffee, writing my note to my mentor Sara Rimer, Michael Kiwanuka’s song Home Again came on. In that exact moment, I had literally been thinking: It has been so helpful for me to have a woman like Sara in my life, especially with my mother gone.

That song came on and I was knocked off my feet. It was like being swept away by a wave.

I first heard that song years ago, right after my mother died. I remember it so clearly. I was sitting on a bean bag chair in Restoration Hardware and it came on. These lyrics pierced my heart like an arrow:

Home again
Home again
One day I know
I'll feel home again
Born again
Born again
One day I know
I'll feel strong again

In that time of my life, I was so broken and so lost. I missed my mother so much and I had so many regrets that wracked my heart about what I could have done differently while she was alive. And I remember hearing the words of that song and just longing to feel that way again someday. Home again. Strong again. Feeling so very far away—like I was looking at that state of being from a distant shore.

Seven years later, sitting at the counter of Life Alive, it came on. And I realized I felt that way. Home. Strong. So grateful for where I am in my life, who I have in my life, and where I am and where I’m heading.

I have literally never heard that song in public any other time but those two—Restoration Hardware and Life Alive, yesterday.

And this is why I believe in everything. Believe in magic, believe my mother is still shining up there and keeping tabs on me, believe in the starry connections, fairy dust, the whole thing.

In a moment the light switched off and it was only stars for miles.