10/27/2024
mm: A Surfer's Journey
Day 55
~ Finding a place to stay on the Oregon coast is never difficult after September. By September, people pack up and head inland, letting the sleepy towns go back to proper sleeping. I found a place to post up in a small, coastal town. The town is very quiet with a main street that leads to the beach. Main street has little to offer even in Summer and, by this time of year, it offers even less. The shop selling candy and fudge is done. There will be no waffle cones until next June and forget about the clam chowder served in some bread bowl. Now, there is only a small shop with limited food, a Mexican place (thank God!) and a health food store that seemed to ignore the memo that the 1970’s are long over. In the mornings, I would cruise over there for some fresh juice.
As a teenager, I was in a car crash. My Plymouth Valiant lived up to her name and valiantly sacrificed herself to save me in a head on collision with a drunk operating a Delta 88. One of a few injuries I suffered was a broken jaw. My mouth was wired shut for 12 weeks. In some kind of draconian attempt to fuse the breaks, an Oral Surgeon placed braces on my teeth and sewed them tightly shut with stainless steel wire, immobilizing my jaw. For the next 3 months, I lived on a liquid diet. During that time, I drank a lot of fresh juice and learned to enjoy it. My mother would make them for me in the morning and I would pack them in a cooler with ice and take them to school. When I was healed and the braces were removed, I still wanted to drink those juices. I knew, after a forced 3 month experiment, that they had done me a lot of good. Within a year, I had a small juice business in Pa’ia that I maintained into my early 30’s. To this day, 40 years after the accident, I still drink fresh juice.
On this morning, the surf was pumping. Too big to paddle out, I decided to enjoy watching the giant waves detonate on the shore. I never tire of watching huge surf breaking. The power is captivating to me. After getting my fill, I walked the beach toward Main Street. When the sand turned to concrete, I walked up the street to the health food store. I knew I was close when I sensed the unmistakable smell of Patchouli oil.
Health food stores have some unique similarities, at least the real ones do. Whole Foods and the other chain stores are not what I am talking about here. No, I am talking about the stores that have a single shop and may or may not be a co-op of multiple owners. Usually, they are packed floor to ceiling with their various products and wares. There are always bulletin boards advertising healing seminars, crystal therapies and yoga classes. The smell in these shops is telltale and is the same no matter which store you enter or where it is located. . The smell is a combination of vitamins, turmeric, bulk spices and patchouli…always patchouli.
Walking in, I move beyond the bulletin board, ignoring the pamphlets offering chakra realignment and energetic transformations by someone named Light. Instead, make my way to the counter to place a juice order. The woman at the counter is abundantly pleasant. She has dreadlocks piled high on her head and they are contained in a colorful wrap of fabric. She smiles and her white teeth and bright eyes light up her face. Who knows, maybe her chakras were recently aligned. I ask her for a carrot, beet and ginger juice. The same juice she has been making me for days. She gave me a ticket to take to a bearded guy to be rung up. The ticket had the amount along with a heart and peace sign written on it.
Back at the counter, she asked me about my camera. She wondered what I was taking photos of. I told her that I shoot a lot of subjects and had no specific subjects in mind. I showed her some of the surf photos that I had just taken. She liked them and told me she thought the ocean, and the negative ions it produces with the crashing surf, was a healing place. Maybe that is what I like about the ocean. Who knows, maybe she is on to something? My whole life, pretty much, has been spent in or near this circulation of ions and, whether I have been healed I cannot say but I do know how much better I feel when I am in the vicinity of breaking waves. We chatted a little more as she finished making my juice. I told her about the project that I am working on and she liked the idea. It seems people are pretty cool with the idea of going around the world in search of beautiful beaches and the people that surf at them. She called out to a guy standing nearby and told me to tell him about the journey. After explaining to him what I was doing, he suggested we go to his place and have a look at what he builds. Always open to what may present itself, I said sure and we walked out to the street.
The guy's name was Henry and he looked to be about 40 years old. He had long brown hair and a beard. He was munching on a vegetarian, breakfast burrito. We walked toward the street and got inside his van. He drove a classic van with odd, wavy stripes painted on it. Inside, it was filled with lumber. We wound around some roads and headed uphill to a grassy place with huge views out to the ocean. Henry parked and we got out. The view looked south down a huge stretch of coast. Henry told me that he was raised here on a 15 acre parcel of land his folks bought. It was a perfect place to spend a lifetime. From here, one would have an ever changing view of the beach and ocean. I like big water views that allow the viewer to look at the infinite space beyond the horizon. The huge surf pounded the beach below us and the sound could easily be heard from where we stood. I envied Henry’s view and could imagine how nice it would be to watch the massive north pacific storms as they approached the land from out to sea. Also, I could just as easily imagine how many days he has witnessed perfect surf from here. The giant windows in his place were built for this very thing.
I stood in the yard outside, still with no idea as to what he wanted to show me. Henry was soft spoken and I liked his vibe. I was curious as to what I was about to see. He went inside and came out a minute later carrying a wooden surfboard under his arm. He was humbly smiling as he walked up to me and put it in my hands. I was immediately surprised by just how light it was.
Henry is a carpenter and builds wooden surfboards in his spare time. The boards are built primarily from cedar with some mahogany and redwood to add some color contrast. The board he handed me was a short, fish design. It was 5’8” and light as a feather. I loved the outline and told him so. He smiled and was happy to have some feedback on his beautiful creation. He invited me inside and I walked with the board in my arms to the front door and went inside. The house was a warm place that was heated by a wood stove. Again, the view was huge and beautiful. The entire front was all glass save the framing it took to keep the huge panes in place. My eyes followed the beach until my focus turned to the other boards stacked up along a wall beside me.
There were 3 boards there. One was a longboard and the others were shortboards. All were shaped by a shaper that knew his way around template outlines and bottom contours. It was clear that Henry had some experience building boards. He confessed to having a background in that area and I was not surprised. These were clearly surfable boards and they all had waxed decks to prove it. Each was a thing of beauty. I was impressed and I thanked him for taking me to see his creations.
We talked about many subjects while having some hot tea. I thanked him for his hospitality and told him that I would walk back to my place instead of taking a ride. We shook hands and I was on my way.
I walked down the wooded road to the beach. The surf was now even more unruly and I enjoyed walking the deserted beach back to the place that I was staying. Inside, I pulled the card from my camera and brought up the photos from our meeting. I have added a few of them for you all to see what it was that impressed me so.
