E's Surf Report: looks great..

warm, body-hugging air at the beach. Slightly-lumpy but fun-looking head-high waves that will probably clean up in an hour or two streaming into the beach. Still i'm feelin' the sore-throat/cloudy-headed sickness pangs so decided to take one more rest day. Feelings of remorse, longing and forlornness swept through me as i headed east on the N-judah. I gazed out the window at the sparkling, glassy ocean-surface and invigorating blue sky as I headed downtown toward the urban concrete jungle and my appointed, fixed cubicle of grey steel and stone. I imagined the thrill, excitement and pleasure oozing from the copious unridden waves only 3 blocks away.. 4 blocks.. 7 blocks... Having this little 4-day forced mini-break has reawakened my appreciation and thankfulness for this activity we do. After months and months of 6-day-a-week surfs i was starting to get a bit jaded and forgetful about the underlying beauty of this wonderous artform we participate in. My own neurotic tendencies have combined with a subtle self-placed pressure to surf everyday for the sake of the surf report. My gut-driven need to surf everyday has intermeshed with a weird "have to" surf everyday. Now that i've taken a few days off, stepped back a bit, i've realize that surfing, in my life at least, is and should be just for fun. raw, simple, pure fun. Not about.. "I need to surf this many days in this many months to achieve this and this maneuver, etc." I mean, pushing yourself is all well and good.. but, you can't let it cloud the reality of the raw, pulpy essence and joyous euphoria of riding waves. pure, simple. Pulling away from the ocean this morning, longingly looking at the stellar conditions, made me jones just for that enjoyment of catching waves. I think that the primal, rudimentary problem-solving dance of tracking down an unbroken wave, anticipating it's trajectory, catching it and riding it, is probably one of the most enjoyable little quirks of existence i've encountered. This is at the heart of why i don't really care if conditions are 2 feet or 12 feet. I remember a glassy, waist-high summer day a few months back when the waves were breaking in about 2 feet of water. there weren't many people out. I had the fricken best time cruising around the lineup in "hunt" mode.. just trying to catch and ride as many little grinders as i could. loving it. I also remember a peaky, scary, spaced-out, double-overhead groundswell day last winter where some subconscious motivations took me over and i had the best time stroking into and over the ledge of some of the biggest, meatiest waves of my life.. I just liked to catch them.. almost more than riding them..

anyway.. just ramblings.. hope y'all enjoyed catching waves this morning..