Not transferable

Yesterday and today I was forced to realize that my hard-won skills are not transferable to waves over three feet. For the first time in months, we had waves that were four feet with occasional larger ones.

And with the bigger waves come the better surfers and the larger crowds.

I regressed to my bad habit of hanging back in the bigger waves because I'm afraid of taking off too late and going over the falls. I didn't go over the falls. I caught a few waves. Yesterday I got up a couple of times, wa-a-a-y into the waves, but didn't do anything much like riding. By the time I got up, these fast waves were slow ones. Once, I got hung up on the ledge (see post of 1/31/08) and yeah, maybe now I could handle the ledge by standing up earlier, but I didn't dare, so I fell off the ledge and go worked in a way that is extremely bad for my back. (Still hurting as I write this.)

The waves were steep and fast. I watched the other surfers and counted the seconds: there were 10- and 11-second rides. That might not sound like very much but it's phenomenally long for our beach.

One funny thing is how even the decent guys, the ones I consider allies, turn into Neanderthals when the waves are bigger. No chatting, not even much smiling. "Out of my way, woman, I'm surfing," is what they are saying by their serious expressions and body language.

Today, a notch smaller than yesterday with bigger lulls that didn't require getting out by the jetty, I caught several waves. But they were so fast I lost pretty much all my popping up skills. A couple of times, I regressed to the knee. Other times, I did manage to stand up with a pop (I think) but lost my balance soon after because the wave was just too fast. On one, I think if I would have stepped forward I would have been OK. On several, I blew the takeoffs by, I think, being too late. Had a big shouting match with C. (well, he was shouting, I haven't got that much volume) regarding his opinion that I could not surf, would never learn to surf, and should not be anywhere near "his" beach. C.'s mouth keeps moving long after he has run out of anything to say so it was necessary to tell him, several times, to shut the f*ck up. This is run of the mill stuff at our break. It's not the first time it's happened and it won't be the last.

Through sheer determination, after several takeoffs in which I tried but failed to stand up, I finally did pop up and get something of a ride, but that was after almost two hours.

I've got a long way to go to get used to the speed of bigger waves and learn how to do on them what I can do on the smaller ones.

It's worth nothing that today I cancelled a doctor's appointment I had already cancelled four times in order to surf today. I have posted many, many times about cancelling appointments and getting out of obligations to surf, and about how most of the time the surfing turns out to be disappointing. (Once I even wished I hadn't cancelled a dentist's appointment to surf---or try to surf which is all I was doing at the time.) I wondered yesterday if I would cancel today's appointment, and hoped I had finally reached the point where rescheduling appointments and ditching obligations was actually worth it (because I could now surf well enough to have a good time). Well, it wasn't. I haven't reached that point---at least when the waves are "good" i.e. above three feet.

It's also worth noting (alas) that the "roll" I've been on in surfing and life in general for the entire month of June has ended with the coming of July. Bad surfing, aching back, car towed, parking tickets, money woes, friends growing more distant. Well, it was a good run and I have a feeling I'll get back on soon.