Surfing Solo

It came about as a last minute split second idea, the kind you make on a dull Sunday afternoon when all you have done all day is sit indoors watching baseball and the sun is burning bright in a cloudless sky. I needed to get back to the sea. I have been surfing religiously for the the past three days chasing the first legit South Swell in weeks ravenously from Huntington Pier down to Laguna and San Clemente. I had surfed a spot Saturday early afternoon which my friends and I sarcastically refer to as Tits, AKA Super-tubes, because on the right conditions this place can dish out spitting tube after flaring tube and is as the name implies "Absolutely Tits". Its was superb on this day, a little crossed up and deceptive at times but on the right wave you could be looking up at a 6 ft pitching lip or standing tall inside of a churning shack staring wild-eyed at the best view of your life. I had this vision pulling into my second wave of the day, standing and pulling into a solid left i attained tremendous speed on the rising wall as i pumped my board through the section, i then turned off the top of the wave and dropped in to the end Bowl. Pulling into this final section, only feet from the shore and in no more that 3 ft of water i experienced the sensation of being fully enveloped by moving water and in that fraction of a second i gazed up at the roof of the barrel and out the exit hole to see the shoreline extending all the way to San Clemente. It was without a doubt one of the most spectacular views i have ever captured in my minds eye, i didn't even mind the thrashing i was dealt at the mercy of the pounding beach break, all i felt was the pure joy of self accomplishment and the satisfaction of having forgotten every other emotion or thought, leaving nothing but the notion of the unadulterated inner peace.
-But i Digress.....
It is now Sunday, and the swell is steadily pushing 7 ft at times and i have decided to paddle out at Huntington state beach solo. It didn't seem like a daunting test of my courage at the time, but then again i hadn't even seen a wave break yet. I park, walk to the nearest high wall and check the surf, it takes a few moments for me to catch a glimpse of a proper 6 ft set of walls peal along the outer shelf. I have seen enough and proceed to rush back to my car to suit up.
Few people understand the mentality of an amped surfer. It is one of pent up excitement, rushing adrenaline, uncontrolible urges to rush headlong into what most people consider a hostile environment and an undying surge of curiosity all mixed into a coktail of emotions so volitile that if an average non-watergoing human were to consume they would most sertainly blackout from a compleat sensory overload(upon waking up they would have to be emidiatly emitted into the nearest mental institution, or emidiatly handed a surfboard themselves). Standing on the shore strapping my leash to my ankle i noticed the ocean had created a channeling rip current for me, making my paddle out 30% easier than normal, i was still accosted by the usual inside crashers that get your hair wet and do a great job of making you feel like there is a bomb set coming on the outside waiting to crush all your hopes and dreams into oblivion. This however did not happen and i positioned myself farther out than the impact zone so as to not get cought inside.
-I have a morbid fear of being caught inside ever since i surfed Trail 5 during the swell of the decade on July 24 of 2009. You think going to school with a bunch of popularity crazed loonies who talk behind your back is a scary notion? Try staring up the face of a 15 ft wall of ocean about to break ten feet infront of your face and not being able to do a thing about it other than abandon ship, take a deep breath and dive for the bottom only to be lifted and dragged for what seems like days under water. But i digress.....
The waves were far from ideal in shape, i was paddling into moving mountain ranges with at least 5 different peaks and cross waves and not to mention nowhere to go once the wave was caught, nowhere but straight down as i found out on my first wave. I looked to set my line going left only to see that the peak was well ahead of me, so i resorted to try to go straight but the nose of my board instantly dove, throwing me ass over tea-cup into the churning mass of the classic Huntington washing machine. Impossible i thought to myself, "there is no way to get into these waves" i said outloud in frustration. I had no time to grummble for i was dead if i stayed in the Impact Zone. The next "makible" wave that came my way was a bit smaller and looked forgiving, so i precieded to tear ass across the face on my 6" 10' Brian Bulkly and kick out as it sectioned. I was then faced with the largest and ugliest set it has ever been my displeasure to lay eyes on at huntington. Demented, disgusting mountain formations of ocean were marching right at me! I paddled frantically to punch through the first one only to see the second wave about ready to crash right on me. "Oh hell no, not while I still breath", i gasped. In moments like this panic is very near to the heart of the surfer, yet he must not let it take hold for if it does he looses all common sense (which in my case is not a big deal because i have been told that i have very little common sense to lose anyway). Neadless to say the wave crashed well ahead of me and i was forced to execute a duck dive while holding on to my board for dear life. Thankfully my board and i punched through in one piece. After my shair of heavy situations i have come to find a way to deal with being shaken up and rattled, it often requires several sets of heavy breathing followed by a little mental pep talk which for me this time went something like, " Your OK. You are ALRIGHT. Pay no attention to the fact that you are utterly alone and there are no surfers out for at least 300 yards in either direction. Focus and pull it together, man!!!!!" Even in my mind i am not the best motivator, but it worked for me because a few more waves came my way, all disfigured and nasty, but i did not lose my cool. Then IT came. The wave was a churning wall at least 6 if not 7 ft tall with a fair amount of chop on and around it, but a small slot of face that looked like a manageable bowl, damn the rest of the gnarly face, so i began to chase this thing down. This was the Big Pappy that i knew was my only chance to salvage the session, so i paddled hard, felt the wave begin to take me and then a split second later the grim realization hit me that there was absolutely no save avenue for me to take in either direction. The right was out of the question and the left had a boil in the face that was already pitching the wave out, i had no choice but to go straight. I felt as though the drop down the face lasted more than a few seconds as the mass of ocean water built up and doubles up under me. It became vertical and i knew there was no way out of it at this point, i was either going to hold fast for dear life or become minssed-meat at the hands of this brute. NOT AN OPTION!!! I managed to iron-leg this puppy out and belly on my board to allow the white wash to push me to shore.
I tell you now i have never been more determined to make a drop nor have i been more relieved to have survived the impossible. When i came ashore i looked at my hands half in disbelief to realize i had made it out of that heavy of a situation, not to mention the stunned looks on the faces of the Asian family that was playing at the waters edge. That's how i knew it was heavy, because the looks they were giving me were ones of utter amazement. I proceeded to walk down the beach, half wanting to paddle back out in a more advantageous spot, but decided against it because the sun was already touching the horizon.
As i gazed out at the waves just as i began to walk off the beach i was overcome with what i would discribe as a self-consious realisation of my own existance in which i had to sit down in the sand and try to keep from breaking into tears in the flood of emotions i felt. In that moment all else in my mind dissapeared, reality became paramount in the sense that i felt simultaniousl the massive release of addrenaline that must have taken hold somewhere in the middle of my drop and the purity of essence that comes from the heart when you have overcome a seamingly insurmountible obsticle. I can tell you nothing can ever come close to that feeling i felt at the edge of the ocean this afternoon, maybe the feeling of the hearts realization of its counterpart in another, but whats true love got to do with it anyway? Love for me comes in the ocean when she presents me with the chance to test myself against her might and when her beauty shines in the light of the setting sun. I believe that it is not stupidity or machismo which draws surfers to the waves, but an undying love for the feeling attained by realizing the purity of ones existence in the simple act of riding a wave.
-Nothing could ever stop me from finding my peace of mind in the sea.