MY FIRST WAVE

Here’s an amazing short story about chance and destiny.  This is the first in a series about my Ugly noseriders, before The Ugly and after:

I’m 13 years old in the summer of 1961.  Living in West Los Angeles, fresh out of New York.  Body surfing State Beach in Santa Monica with my 19-year-old sister, when a guy picks her up and offers to sideline me by inviting us to try surfing on his friend’s surfboards.  His friend is the lifeguard about a mile and a half away, down by the pier.  I, of course, said “YES!”  My sister reluctantly agreed so we walked to the lifeguard’s tower on the north side of the pier where there were three surfboards leaning against the tower.  The waves were small.  I was about five foot six inches tall and weighed about 130 pounds. The lifeguard gave me a rather large longboard and told me to paddle out, while he concentrated on my sister along with his buddy who brought us there.  I paddled out beyond the waves then started paddling in when the lifeguard yelled “Paddle, paddle…” to catch the wave.  “Paddle, paddle.” He yelled again and then I felt the wave pick up the board and carry me forward.  Then he yelled, “Stand up!” and I did.  I was surfing straight in, standing up on the very first wave I tried to catch.  I rode the one foot wave for about 30 feet, where it gently landed me on shore. I easily stepped off the board, onto the sand.  My sister and her two new boyfriends cheered and applauded me.  Then my sister said that we had to go.  One wave, one longboard and I was hooked on surfing. 

I didn’t stop nagging my dad till he got me my own board, after I negotiated an early Christmas present. Once he relented, we jumped into his car and headed up to Malibu looking for a surf shop.  Dive and Surf stood out on the landward side of PCH, just a few hundred yards down from the pier.  Neither my dad nor I knew what to look for.  The sales guy must of known we were ignorant city slickers and pulled out a used nine foot two inch, nineteen inch wide balsa wood board, painted white and it weighed a ton.  It was sold to us for the sale price of $45.  All my dad knew was that $45 was within his budget for an early Christmas present that year.

1962, Corona del Mar at 13 with the Balsa board.

Surfing was a cultural phenomenon in 1961.  Surfing was the craze all over the country.  Everyone at Emerson Junior High School was into it.  I got my mom to trade off weekends with other parents to take me and my buddies surfing.  During the day we surfed, at night we went to the surf movies at the Santa Monica Civic.  I remember vividly seeing Lance Carson dazzling the audience while riding the nose at Malibu. His casual style, while suspended on the nose, was magical.  The next day everyone talked about emulating him.  Malibu was the place where the magic was being made and we begged our moms to take us surfing there almost every weekend. If the waves were not there, then we would travel as far north to Rincon, or down south to Wind n’ Sea.  At first my buddies would laugh at how out of style my Balsa wood board was and explained how the lighter foam boards were easier to turn.

There were a lot of phonies then. I was one of them, and I knew it.  I even peroxided my hair to fit in with the bronzed look.  However, after I turned 14 I wanted to bust out of that syndrome though.  My friend sold to me his eight-foot nine inch, green panel Bing surfboard for $15 because the fin broke.  I got it fixed and the lighter Bing made a big difference in my development.  I destroyed the nose of my Balsa board learning how to noseride, but on the Bing I was noseriding like a champ.  So, I asked my dad to enter me in the Santa Monica mid-winter championships in December of ’62. 

Dewey Weber surfboards was the top shop and his team wore bitchen red trunks and windbreakers with the team logo on top of a white competition stripe.  They were also know as the “Red-jackets” and they seemed to be everywhere on the beach that day.  I knew the girls would love to see me in that outfit and on that team.  Also, Dewey and his team were all over the magazines.  I won my first heat and beat out one of Dewey’s team members. Of course I had to make mention of it to Dewey when he walked by me.  He suggested that I try out for the team, which I did.  The rest is history.