Surfin' USA
“Do I wax the bottom of the board?”
“Sure, why not.”
“My wetsuit smells like pee?”
“That’s because someone peed in it just before you put it on Phyllis.”
And this sad little troop of kook monkeys are all mine. One pretty, neat little line, on their soft foam boards, on their soft pink tummies. How do they get even the simple maneuver of fake paddling so wrong? Totally uncoordinated. Just helplessly flailing arms and legs, kicking sand into each other's mouths and eyes. Some have probably never been in the sea and I’m not even sure if this one can swim.
“That’s enough!” I growl. This one in whiteface caked with zinc, this one squinting up at me, blinded by the sun and my immense coolness.
“Why are you all here today? Surfing is the worst thing you can try to do, and even if by some miracle you do it today, your life will never be the same, and not in a good way.”
Exhibit A: Me. A perfect example. More like a perfect specimen.
They grimace and squirm on the hot sand.
“Most of you will be lucky to make it out of the ocean alive and in one piece today. If you doubt this fact, or doubt me, get up and go home now.”
A stick insect of a ‘man’ wearing a big floppy hat clambers to his feet and slinks away with his tail between his legs. More computer than man. A pasty office supply, like a piece of stationary. He trips over his leash and cries. The rest of the girl scouts hold their own.
“Now, let’s practice popping up.”
‘Little’ Robbie from Ohio can barely get from his belly to his trotters. The laborious endeavor leaves him greasy and gasping. He has a Rubenesque figure, such as that of an early renaissance female nude. Voluptuous isn’t the right word, but it is the first word that comes to mind. Remember, this is a thirteen year old boy.
“I’ll definitely work on that coach.” He lies.
“Which foot does the rope go on?”
“It doesn’t matter for you Becky, just pick whichever one you like.”
Is this it? Surely we can’t go on. Heads, rails and fins collide and splinter. The humanity, the mayhem! Babies screaming in the distance. Surf madness!
The Four Horsemen of the Surf Apocalypse: Ben Gravy, The Inertia, Catch Surf and Erik Logan.
Would that this were the Golden Age of Piracy, I would see to it that Ben Gravy was keelhauled from bow to stern and that “Elo” was drawn, quartered and hanged from the yardarm for all to witness.
That’s why these damp lemmings are here. Here to steal my dear surfing soul. And I’m complicit in all of it.
“What about jellyfish?”
“Jellyfish should be your primary concern and fear. More surfers are actually killed by lethal jellyfish than by sharks within their first year of surfing. The numbers are astounding!”
We’re belly deep now. I see them quaking with terror but complaining about the cold. Suddenly they abandon everything they have learnt. It all falls apart in real time. A pre-teen get’s swept into a rip and dragged outside. A middle aged businesswoman gets smashed by her board square in the puss. Rubenesque Robbie fails to push through the foot of white water. Someone’s little princess is whining that her hair is matted with putrid smelling red seaweed. This is surfing.
For an hour we struggle against the endless assault of foam. I scurry between them, manhandling both craft and rider through and over swells, swiftly swinging them around before launching them shoreward. I ride the tail in order to try and delay the brutal and inevitable nose dive.
“Great job, you’re getting so close. Just keep doing that.”
On to the next one. This strange rouze. They can’t wait to tell their friends in Missouri, “Heck yeah, I surfed. I’m a surfer.”
After a few minutes the excuses to quit begin to surface. “I think I’m getting a rash.” “There’s sand in my wetsuit.” “It’s cold and my eyes hurt.” I tell them to go sit on the beach but they know I will disown them if they do.
“Is this one coming a good one coach?” I ignore the question and drive Phyllis into the impact zone.
In case you were wondering, none of this is legal. The health department told us to shut down last summer due to Covid-19 but The Fat Man refused to heed. I don’t get hazard pay.
The beach is no place to be employed and surfers generally make for pretty terrible employees in my experience. It’s all one big fuck show. Working in the sun and salt water means that I can eat an assortment of potent gummies throughout the work day and people think nothing of my bloodshot eyes.
By the time class is over the whole thing is a bummer. This romantic beach boy mirage has faded. A blurred postcard: Aloha from hell. No Duke, No Dora.
I never want to see these landlocked, terrestrial hicks again, not from resentment, I’m just over them. But there is one more stupid question to ask and it comes from me.
“Did everyone have fun?”
The sunburnt glow, fatigued gratitude. “Oh yeah!” That was so awesome. I can't believe I surfed. I really surfed!
I feel worse.
Exhausted middle aged women lie comatose on the wet sand. Rashed and pickled children run to ask mom and semi-aloof stepdad if they saw their wave. The schoolteacher asks if I want to grab a beer some time to chat about the WSL. No sir, I do not.
The same barneys show up every day. Figuratively the same one’s if not literally. They sign their life into my hungover hands, ink running on the crumpled waivers from sea water. They show up with a brand new Tuflite under their arm and their uncle’s dive suit from the ‘80s.
“Someone yelled at me out their car window this morning and I think they called me a kook.
What does that mean?”
“Consider yourself lucky.” I say.
The questions never end. Questions about beaches and tide and wind, boards and wetsuits, types of wax. Until I'm left with no choice but to scramble over the rocks at low tide, paddle deep beyond where they can reach me. But not for long. –Joel van Wyk.
