water was clear as the sky. We sat inside at the mellow edge of
the rip and paddled into waisthigh rollers that carried us
hooting in to the beach. We had the place to ourselves. The
sandbanks rippled underfoot, schools of herrings swerved and
morphed as one in the channel, and across in the bay the
breaths of breaching dolphins hung in the air.
I will always remember my first wave that morning. The
smells of paraffin wax and brine and peppy scrub. The way the
swell rose beneath me like a body drawing in air. How the wave
drew me forward and I sprang to my feet, skating with the wind
of momentum in my ears. I leant across the wall ofupstanding
water and the board came with me as though it was part of my
body and mind.The blur of spray. The billion shards of light.
Iremember the solitary watching figure on the beach and the
flash of Loonie's smile as Iflew by; I was intoxicated. And
though I've lived to be an old man with my own share of
happiness for all the mess I made, I still judge every joyous
moment, every victory and revelation against those few seconds
of living.
We surfed until we were limp and when we floundered ashore the
bloke I'd noticed before was waiting. He sat on the back of a
cut-down Kombi with a red dog that sprang down to meet us.
Life on the ocean wave, eh boys? said the bloke with his board
-bump knees drawn up to his beard.
My teeth were chattering and I couldn't speak but Inodded.
Irecognized him as the one who paddled out when the surf was
huge, the man with the old-timey board.
You wouldn't be dead for quids, wouldja?
We just shook out heads in agreement and lauthed and shuddered
while the red dog danced circles around us. The bloke smiled as
though we were the funniest sight he'd seen all yiar. He
whistled the dog up and we bolted to where our clothes lay
warmed from a day in the sun.
The Volkswagen hawked and sputtered to life. The bloke wheeled
it atound on the sand and looked at us a moment before offering
us a lift. He waited, laughing, while we fumbled numbly with
buttons and buckled.
We bounced up the track with the dog lapping at our salty ears.
At the top of the hill where our bikes lay in the weeds, he
pulled up and we climbed our, burning with pins and needles
where the circulation had kicked bacd in.
You're a pair of hellmen, you two, he said through the cab
window.
Why's that? said Loonie.