I’ve discovered there are different levels of surfing/surfers. I suppose I should have realized this before now. Like every sport, there’s the casual hobbyist, the star professional, and everyone in between. What’s of more interest to me is that surfers at these different levels can face similar challenges. The ocean is the ocean, and its conditions vary with the weather. However the ocean *feels* on any given day determines what your surfing is going to be like and how you adjust your behavior.
The waves this weekend were relentless—to me and other novice surfers that is. I arrived at the beach during high tide and many experienced surfers were leaving the beach at that time. Now powered by far away Hurricane Florence, the waves seemed to have new strength. Me and other newbies floundered. A lot of us couldn’t make it past the break (not entirely sure if I’m using that term correctly). The surfers that did make it out there weren’t really riding the waves that often or that well.
Everything was more difficult than the last day I went out. Swimming was laborious, getting on the board and staying on was a monumental effort, and worst of all, controlling my board as I walked out was a great feat in itself. The board I rented had a mind of its own. The back end felt like it was heavier and dragged wherever I didn’t want it to go. After about thirty minutes of being continually pushed sideways by the ocean, I knew I wasn’t going to make it past the break without putting myself and others in danger.
I decided to focus on a new goal. Get on the board, stay on the board, body board some easy waves, and take control of my swimming with four or five strokes toward the break. This sounds easy enough now that I write it down, but the thing is that I have no arm muscles. They’re pathetic little things—spaghetti noodles wrapped in tallow that I’m reminded exist the morning after I go surfing. Making my modest goals a reality would be an achievement for my puny biceps and perhaps for my abs as well.
I remembered to really engage my core strength about an hour into the endeavor. I chastised myself for forgetting the most important part of staying in balance, but kept going. I waited for a brief lull in the pounding, got on the board, body boarded through two small waves, and got about seven or eight strokes in before being wiped out for the seven hundredth time.
All told, I kind of enjoy wiping out. There’s something about it that reminds me of a washing machine and my childhood fantasies of tumbling around with my clothes in sudsy water. I always pop back up to the surface smiling, ready, and willing to spar with the ocean again. A small, berserk voice in the back of my head (I call him Todd) tells me to show that mean ocean who’s boss.
About fifteen minutes after that, I ran out of steam. I went back to my spot, ate some salmon jerky, drank some water, checked the time on my board rental, and tried to regroup. I took an inventory of my body and how I was feeling. Tiny scrape on my forearm. No big deal. A loss of energy, but not insurmountable with a short break.
The first word that came to mind when I assessed my mood was dEfeAteD. I didn’t feel that bad though—I just wasn’t going to make the progress I expected. I figured I should just focus on what was achievable. Was I going to go out again? Definitely. Was I going to get on the board again? Absolutely. Was I going to make it past the break? Probably not. Could I enjoy body boarding as these powerful waves pushed me back to shore? No sweat.
I did all that, dried off, and went back to return my board. I dropped my board off in the vertical cubbies on the side of the shop and walked in on a conversation between the middle aged man behind the counter and three enraptured 18–20 year old men who had just gotten in from the water as well.
“And this is in Africa, right down on the west coast,” the middle aged man told the younguns. “And he told me it was just so hard, man, struggling to get out. He was going out and going out and getting nothing. And he was like, ‘I stopped, I focused, and I had my peanut butter, you know, all that. I tell you, I swam four and half miles and had about eleven seconds of surfing. I just couldn’t.’ If anyone else would have told me that I would have been like [skeptical ‘whatever’ face], but this guy—this guy is a top guy. He’s a professional surfer and he couldn’t even do it.”
I’m sure this top guy would have thought the waves I’d just faced were child’s play, but it felt good to know some of my tactics were the right ones. Try, stop, focus, refuel with protein, think about what you’re doing, and go back at it. Super fun. No doubt about it.
annaxmalina
baratheonpilled
discoholicmusic
vaporwave
origamiaround
