The End of Innocence

I don't know what it means to get older because I haven't gotten there yet. Maybe it's just a matter of perspective anyway. I do know that things start to change at some point though, and this year has been indicative of that. My situation is looking pretty rosy compared to what some friends have been through this year. We all lose a bit of innocence every time something like this happens.

One friend's dad had a stroke this summer while our friends were together for a weekend of fun and college reuniting. I couldn't help but think of my own parents and their health. They are healthy now and I hope they stay that way for a long time, but eventually all of our bodies start to fail us.

A family member was forced to declare bankruptcy after a long period of unemployment. This person didn't want this to happen and had always worked diligently. It's tragic.

While politicians were out hustling votes on November 2, legendary surfer Andy Irons passed away in a Dallas hotel room from what appears to be a drug overdose/ illness combination. AI surfed some of the heaviest waves in the world with casual style and ease. For him to die is surely a sign that none of us are exempt from what live can throw at us.

Finally, just yesterday a family friend and neighbor I have known since age 11 was found dead from suicide. He was such an awesome kid. Fun, shy and ridiculously smart. Just a few days before, on facebook he was looking forward to watching the Chargers and finishing finals. He just couldn't go on for some reason we may never know. This made me think about just how delicate our emotional states of being actually are. We can go from hot to cold in no time. The guy we are having drinks with on Saturday can be completely hopeless on Tuesday. I'll never forget the fun times I had with him.

Our family and friends are all that matter. All the rest is nada. It's a shame that events like these - and a rapid loss of innocence - are what it takes to make us mindful about those around us.

Is he just fucking with us?

Jordy Smith is an excellent surfer. Perhaps the best since Slater (I don't use that lightly - AI, Dane, Joel, and Mick deserve honorable mentions). However, there is something bizarre about ol' Jordy and it's not just his nipples as Lewis Samuels pointed out.

The guy is either copying Dane Reynolds' style to try to be cool, or is copying Dane's style to fuck with us. Dane is already biting hipster style so maybe Jordy is way more savvy than we all think and it mocking all fashion.

Such an ironic shirt and smile, Dane!

Case in point. In 2009 Dane wore a denim shirt through the summer to a couple parties at which he was photographed. Jordy showed up to the Surfer Poll awards the same year in a denim shirt. Don't they look cute?

This year in Australian Dane had some paintings on his board, hipster style characters with a black background. Jordy soon had the same thing.

In Europe this Fall Dane painted the top of his board with some black streaks. Jordy followed suit.

Next the tour went to Puerto Rico. Dane drew giant Quiksilver logos on his boards for the world to see. Jordy decided to get "artistic" with his Hawaii quiver. (check it here: http://www.surfline.com/surf-news/sequence-of-the-week-jordy-smith--world-number-two-whips-massive-backside-no-grab-air-reverse-at-l_50819/)

Finally Mr. Smith decided to launch a website to showcase his talents, which are vast. Mr. Reynolds has been operating a website for the last year or so (marinelayerproductions.com) with some ultra-hip esoteric music and clips of him ripping. Jordy didn't want to be left in the fray. His site (jordysmith.com) could only accurately be described as Dane's site moving sideways.

This makes me return to my initial question: is Jordy fucking with us? If he is it's pretty funny. Dane is "cool" to the surf industry because he doesn't care. He's the anti-hero. His speeches are sooo funny and self-depricating and he rips to boot! By mocking Dane, Jordy makes himself the anti-anti-hero, who comes here to rip and be a surfer who loves point breaks and cougars, not Pavement, the Flaming Lips, old cameras, shitty cars, or thrift store outfits.

If JS isn't fucking with us it's lame. Copying hipster style is perhaps the worst thing one can do. It is the definition of unhip. If I had Jordy's money I would just walk around naked. Schlong out for the world to see. Problem solved.

Paris dans l'ete, homme de passion

Paris in the summer is nothing short of dreamy. The food is excellent, the boats pass up and down the Seine as tourists cluelessly navigate bumpy streets while sweating in their 3/4 length pantaloons. Paris and I had 2 brief encounters in 3 weeks and they were both splendid. The first included an 8 hour layover in the middle of the day, a nice ham and cheese salad, miles of walking and quite a bit of sweating. The second bears a little more explanation.

I had been staying in the southwest of France, swimming in warm water and working by day, drinking Heineken and red wine by night. I didn't want to leave one bit and decided to make the most of my departing night, in which I would arrive at 11pm and have to leave the next morning at 11am. Plenty of time to have a good time at a hotel somewhere other than the airport. I saw on facebook that a friend would be in Paris at the same time and arranged to meet. (If you're reading this... you're not reading this).

This particular young lady had held a small piece of my fancy for the first part of the year. We met on New Years and she was what I look for in a lady from what I understand of the topic: smart, sexy, and confident. She also had an excellent set of butt cheeks from what I remember beyond the haze of Jameson. She seemed interested in my buddy LeJay'De and that was that. Twas sour grapes.

I got a recommendation for a bar that (I thought) was in an area I knew in Paris. I hustled to my hostel and quickly grabbed a cab toward the bar. I didn't bring the address but I had seen a map and figured I could get there. The cabbie didn't know the bar I was asking for so I jumped out and began walking around Paris, near Norte Dame and Gare Saint-Michel. The ensuing hour included asking "where is this bar?" in French about 75 times, lots of running and lots of sweating. It also started raining.

I eventually got in another cab and asked the cabbie to take me to the bar or try to call someone to get directions. He refused and I got out before he got going. I wouldn't be meeting my friend.

But the lord provideth, and when I jumped out I saw a group of six kids a bit younger than me and heard them speaking American English. I was delirious and dazed.

"Americans!" I said.

We began talking. They were studying abroad for the year and had just arrived days before. They didn't now the city and had been walking around exploring, trying to find a bar their friends were at. We weren't so different, they and I. One of them had an excellent butt, while another took to me and she was quite cute. We walked around for a while and eventually found a bar where we could sit and look at Notre Dame from across the Seine.

I tried to figure out a way I could have sex with the cute one with the sweet ass, or the other one, or both, but it wasn't to be. My hostel bed was the top bunk in a room with 3 other guys. Not conducive to a menage a trois. Or deux. Or for that matter, un.

I licked my wounds which weren't really wounds. I was and remain a man of passion. There will never be anything to be ashamed of when it comes to that.

Nobody Says It Like Neil

Milk and Honey

On my trip to New York City a couple months ago I visited a speakeasy called Milk and Honey on the lower east side. The place had some epic Prohibition cocktails and this message in the men's bathroom:

It reads:

Recalling
certain gentlemen of other days,
who made of drinking
one of the pleasures of life,
not one of its evils;
and who,
whatever they drank,
proved able to carry it,
keep their heads
and remain gentlemen,
even in their cups.
Their example is commended
to their posterity.

I Was Born to be a Regularfoot

It's true.

I ride waves with my right foot forward, but things were not supposed to be this way. I now understand people like Chastity (now Chaz) Bono, or Meg from Family Guy feel - people who had sex change operations because they felt like a men. I am a goofyfoot but I feel like a regularfoot.

I am right-handed, a key predictor of regularfootedness. I also skate and snowboard regular. I have tried doing those goofy and I just can't. It doesn't feel natural.

I love Santa Barbara and its litany of point breaks. I want to ride them frontside.

I see lefts and imagine I am Slater doing crazy tight turns, or Dane doing fin wofts.

I see rights and imagine I am Parko spreading butter all over everything.

Alas, I am destined to surf goofy. I could have been better than Slater if I were born a regularfoot (and that's my claim going forward), but it's too late to change. I will have to settle for surfing Rincon on my backhand, Uluwatu on my forehand, and still going straight on all these LA closeouts.

Sad, it is.

Channeling Sheng-Yen

Chan (Chinese Zen) Master Sheng-Yen wrote a book called There is No Suffering. It offers excellent insight into Buddhist philosophy, which I enjoy. The book takes its title from The Heart Sutra, a teaching that is central to Buddhism. There is no bible equivalent in Buddhism, but this is the probably the closest thing. One day I will transcribe it because it has an amazing ancient poetic style.

I digress.

The point of The Heart Sutra is to show that suffering is an illusion and when we integrate this idea into our lives we attain enlightenment. Basically, it is saying that life is full of a bunch of things that have no meaning and we attach negative meaning to them, which makes us suffer.

I know some things that are illusions:

There is no suffering and no end of suffering,
There is no surfing and no end of surfing,
There is no right path and no wrong path.
There are no paths and there is no box.
There is no school,
No right and no wrong,
No debit, credit, or credit card debt.
There is no physical pain and no mental pain.
There are no waves and no no waves.
There are certainly no rights and no lefts.
No points or reefs, no beachbreaks.
There are no friends and no enemies,
No deep conversations
Or ephemeral lust.
I have reason to doubt the existence of Australia,
Argentina, Algeria, Austria and Albania,
And I know there is no France.
Life does not exist and does not end.
Birth exists now and now and now
And thus does not exist.
There is no mind
No thoughts and no surviving ego.
There is no present
But there is really no past or future.
I will not grow old or grow young.
None of us exist now and
We will all one day cease to exist.