posts: 99244
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| post_id | thread_id | thread_title | post_number | author_username | post_date | post_date_iso | post_body |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 99244 | 2756 | So.... How old is everyone? | 62 | poidog | Jul 16, 2016 | 2016-07-16T02:37:13-0400 | Here's the funny thing about surfing, for me. Have been obsessed with other sports, wrestling and baseball in particular, to the point where I was able to achieve a certain level of mediocrity (without obsession would've fallen so far short of mediocrity it makes me shudder). Wrestled DIII in college (dog years from II, light years from I; still, won only two more matches than lost, textbook mediocrity, though wouldn't have gone to college otherwise), played baseball until 22, fast-pitch softball (the bomb, once) until 30, slo-pitch until 50. Couldn't get enough of either sport. Now? If I happen to catch an NCAA match while flipping through channels all I can think is, "What was I thinking?" and baseball is groundhog day. Surfing, though. Surfing makes me wake up at one a.m., like it did yesterday, an hour and a half before the alarm, drive three hours to the shore, arriving so early took a nap in the car before paddling out in pre-dawn dimness, which, at first light, revealed itself to be side-shore slop (okay, whatever), though as the tide dropped and the wind switched off-shore it cleaned up considerably, then became glass, through which rolled knee to thigh peaks, lefts or rights, a perfect summer day, time-lapse showing the beach filling up, lifeguards planting flags, umbrellas, kids screaming, friends in the lineup (recognizable, without glasses, by their boards, "Bill? Bill! How the f*ck you been?"), sun rising, steaming off scattered clouds until it was a Tensor lamp, staggered off the beach at 12:30, seven-plus hours of bliss, the only words in the thought bubble above my head being those of gratitude and, without sounding maudlin, a foreshadowing of regret when I can't do this anymore. |