Saturday, September 01, 2007

Finding Oneself


All kinds of philosophical thoughts come up during the experience of surfing. One of my favorites occurred on a day in Nicaragua when the sea was finally showing swell again after a week-long flat spell. A guy who I'd gotten to know, who worked at a nearby surf camp, explained the lumpy, disorganized conditions by saying, "It's trying to find itself."

Since then I've always enjoyed thinking of the ocean as a conscious being with its own personality.

Sometimes moody: "It's angry."
Sometimes scattered: "It's confused."
Sometimes sick: "It's hung over."
Sometimes benevolent: "It's generous."

I wonder how it'll be feeling tomorrow, when I head to Crescent City for the day?

Spoon - The Underdog

7 comments:

Foul Pete said...

"It is going to slap me around for not paying it enough attention."

Patch said...

I found myself flirting with her for the last eight days.

Anonymous said...

Crusty Shitty for the day?

Chum said...

"Crusty Shitty" - that's almost how Crescent City was feeling. Plenty of crusties, but the waves improved throughout our 3 hour session. Itty bitty, but fun.

G said...

Crescent City was feeling mangosteiney

Anonymous said...

Not a reference to waves necessarily, just what we used to call that place. As you can imagine logged a lot of time there back in the Ashland days.

Kim said...

I like this perspective.