bwundrow

Many years back I was selected for a jury panel. It was some young kid charged with posession of cocaine. The defense kept alluding to some new “3 strikes you’re out” law which would get the prosecutor all wound up and the judge telling us to ignore what we heard. In the end we found him guilty. The judge then told us that, “this was the first ‘3 strikes you’re out’ case to be found guilty in the state of California. Sentencing would occur at a later date, 20 years to life minimum.” The entire panel was thunderstruck. I was so disheartened, so disappointed with the justice system. Talk about getting screwed….

Beginners start by riding the whitewash and have a blast just standing up. Eventually you get good enough to get down the line a bit and you’re hooked. If you stick with it for a few years, you’ll push yourself and get into some bigger and better waves. That’s when you get to experience the true thrill of surfing, when your capable enough to put yourself into critical parts of the wave and make it.

Surfing, for me, has been the most difficult sport to master, but also the most rewarding. It takes tremendous courage to push your limit, to go out in conditions that are beyond your comfort zone, whether that’s 3’ waves or 20’ waves, and endure. That’s when you’ll join the ranks and understand the surfing diehards, the one’s who make everything else revolve around surfing. And that’s when all you do is ‘live to surf’.

I swim with dolphins quite frequently, but it’s in the open ocean. There are lots of dolphins in San Diego where I surf, they enjoy playing in the waves just as we do. I see them frequently at Blacks and Del Mar. I have seen 20 or so dolphins all riding the same wave, a couple feet apart, coming right at me. Admittedly, it was rather frightning, even though I see them all the time. They are large animals, moving quite fast, and coming directly towards me. Fortunately they are incredibly agile. Unfortunately, they are also pranksters of a sort and wait until the very last second before they turn away. After I came up from going under the wave they were on, I couldn’t help but admire the true locals of our surf spots.