Waking Up Slowly

This morning Oceanside is waking up slowly. The heavy shroud of sleep still blankets the beach; the ocean is sleep walking with the gentle push of the tide. Small, lazy, wandering.

I was more awake than the surf, so it made for a frustrating mis-match of expectations. This caesura in the steady stream of Summer Southern Swells is filled with anticipatory anxiety, filled with neurotic, addictive yearning for the bigger better waves. In these empty spaces, these endless moment of waiting, you have to sit with yourself. You can blame the waves for your anxiety, your doubts, your missed waves, your insecurity, your boredom, but ultimately, the waves have little to do with it.

In Buddhism, we pay attention to these moments and sit with them, noticing the restless clinging, the wanting wanting wanting, and born out of the wanting the illness of frustration, then morphing into contraction and anger. Spying another enjoying a wave, when you haven't had one in, GOD AT LEAST 30 MINUTES--how desire distorts time! Or another surfer casually paddling near the peak, YOUR peak, near the wave that YOU have been waiting FOREVER for. You see the look their eyes, the same one they see in yours, this creepy wanting of the smallest, slowest wave...


I guess that's the general mood I had out there this morning. The crowd was incredibly calm, despite this inner wanting that I could read in the collective body language. Or perhaps it is just me perceiving the projection of my own inner battles onto to others... I can't know. But I practiced letting go of this tension, this greed and frustration. I practiced and practiced. But still felt the emotional sulfuric hot-spring bubbling up over and over again.

Currently, I am riding Frankenstein, Liz's old, beloved beater board, while I am awaiting the call from JP Holeman announcing the arrival of my new board is ready. Frankenstein is a South Coast 9'0 that has been around the proverbial block, but literally underneath the wheels of Greg's car. OOPS! This morning's was the fourth or fifth session in a row with this board, so we have moved past the awkward introductions. We've moved passed the embarrassing first dances, tripping over each others toes, like the first slow dances in junior high school. Like two pre-teens investigating the mysteries of the opposite sex: at once excited and fearful. The cautious moving towards, then the sharp recoiling after an unexpected shift in movement. No, we've moved into a gentle friendship. We don't ask or expect much of each other; we just enjoy the time we have together before we part ways, as is the inevitable. In a few days we will hug and say our good-byes, and both move onto other adventures in other places, in other times.