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A Surfer’s Trunk
When Alvaro and I finish my Sunday morning surfing lessons, it's 9:30 or 10:00 a.m., depending when we started. At that time, more drivers covet spots in the Taco Hell parking lot than are available. So once I reach my car, there's always someone waiting who was driving behind me as I walked over to it. "Are you leaving?" they always ask. My answer is Read more...
Tonight, I fell in love with evening surfing
"Don' get crazy about it," Alvaro says, his Peruvian accent dropping the "t." Alvaro is my surf instructor. He tells me "don' get crazy about it" a lot: when I'm practicing my pop-ups on the beach, when he sees me paddling toward him in the water, when I breathe in his general direction. The thing is, when I'm surfing, I really *don'* get crazy. When Read more...
Surfing with Richard
This morning, my friend Richard, a Pacifica resident and longtime surfer, joined us in the water. Well, my instructor, fellow student, and I stayed by the shore and surfed the whitewash while Richard paddled out to catch today’s very big waves. I saw him a couple times out there, but I’ve since lost him to a figurative and literal sea of white surfboards. Today, I Read more...
Other Surfers and Large Waves
This morning, I confronted my two biggest surfing fears: other surfers and large waves. Unfortunately, these two monsters travel in pairs. It's easy to feel calm about surfing when both the ocean and your fellow surfers are even-tempered. When the waves get excited, surfers do, too: They can get greedy about catching the beautiful waves and be hostile with anyone in the lineup encroaching on Read more...
Learning to Surf at 52
"The message I want to share is: Don't delay. Go for it now. Surfing creates community. Surfing brings joy. And it's teaching me to live fearlessly." -Danielle Cass, a Berkeley surfer who learned to surf a year ago at 52 For a happiness boost, take the two minutes to watch Cass's video about how and why she started surfing at 52. https://vimeo.com/694504514 We all need Read more...
Surfing Cayucos Pier
Greetings from Cayucos’s Southside Pier, where I just played in the waves with a surfboard. To say I surfed would be engaging in hyperbole. To say I repeatedly lifted my board over every wave while deciding not to catch it would be more accurate. This morning, I drove the twenty minutes here from my Cambria hotel because I’d read glowing reviews about Good Clean Fun, Read more...