3:00 AM.. An El Cap Story.

Woke up at 3:00 am today. Not good. I can't really sleep anymore. If I make it to 5:00 it's a miracle. I am frozen in fear, time, indecision, something.. I really can't fathom having to start over again.. and maybe we don't have to. But maybe I should. Jeez.. this is some bad writing. It has been a bad week I guess. Business is bad. This separation seems bad. My decision making is bad. I am getting a bad headache just sitting here.. or is it the just wine. Oh yeah the drinking.. Bad.


I am trying to recall the week but, it just seems bad. It's true, there was some surf. 4 sessions to be exact. (I know what you are thinking.. I should get out more.. But that's the average) Unfortunately.. Most of the joy has been yanked out of that. It is true that while in the act of riding a wave, I can still manage a peaceful zen like state. Or depending on the size and shape of the wave, and taking into account my positioning, and or probability of making the wave, I may even achieve the state of, Oh shit! Why did I take off on this! Even missing the first wave of the set, turning around, only to see the 4 more bigger waves bearing down on your position is better than all the crap I have going on in my head today. But as soon as you kick out, or pop back up to the surface, your reality smacks you right in the head.

Not a care in the world for this guy..

I might point out that these acts of blissful unawareness are short. 5, 10, 15, 2, seconds? Even a 200 yard ride from Indicator lefts past the Rivermouth might only be 25 seconds at best? I don't even know. Luckily time slows down out there. You can almost make it stop in the barrel. Still. Whats a good session? 20, 30, waves.. That's probably high but, I have been catching a lot of waves. 10 waves an hour would seem like a pretty good return on your investment. Lets say at Rincon where most of the waves are pretty long you net an average of 10, 12 second rides. That's one hundred and twenty seconds of actual "zen like peace" 2 minutes of bliss for an hour. Maybe some dolphins show up and catch a few, or it's big and consistent and you are constantly dodging the bigger sets. I will add another 10 minutes of distraction for that. Almost 15 minutes of blissful ignorance. They were right. It is a complete waste of time. They say that about golf and fishing too. But still a surf that was only 50% satisfying, will still be 50% more satisfying than doing nothing.. I guess.

This might not be bliss, but it is certainly a distraction.

I certainly don't know where I am going with this but, yes, I am in a depressive cycle. Brought on from one or more new difficult situations I am currently mishandling or over reacting to.. Don't worry. I have many years of experience at this depression stuff, and have found some ways to cope. Now.. I am going to get serious here in case anyone who actually reads this finds themselves spiraling down.. Like me.

1)Go outside and take a walk. Luckily I have my dog Riley. So there is no way he is giving up his morning walk no matter how sorry I feel for myself. If you don't have a dog, go adopt one.. maybe.

2)Keep doing the things you enjoy even though joy seems to have been sucked out of them. There's that bumper sticker "A bad day of surfing beats a good day of work" It's kind of like that. It can be hard to sit out there on a slow day and think about your ills but, in the end you will glad you did. I noticed they have those bumper stickers for golf, and fishing too. So I guess, if you don't surf, golf, or fish... well... hmm.. God be with you..

3)I came up with this one. "Be nice to strangers" You know despite the fact we live in a world where most of us hardly know the neighbors. I have found most people to be pretty cool. This method worked great during what I guess you could our 6 month trial separation.(April-October) I will definitely be using it again now that we have entered our official separation. Having a dog works great for this too. Ceta, Feta, Missy, all had great owners to talk too. The old couple sharing coffee at Bates every morning. Supermarket Checkout People. I guess it make me feel I am not alone.

4) Write a song. Write 2 songs. Write 10. Make them so sad. Sing then so loud that it makes you cry. Ok.. That probably won't help but.. How do you think all these songs get written?

A view to die for..

Those are a few things that help me out, but still today, the my universe is off balance. The moral of the story is this. Out of the 4 surf sessions this week.. Monday really sucked, the waves were good. Still going overhead but, because I was hungover from Valentines Day and couldn't even stay in the water, I felt like throwing up. That Monday ended up being a complete "my life is falling apart day" Glad it is over. There was a nice uncrowded "in between swells" day at Indicator which was fun but, I still had a lot of distractions going on in my head. Saturday.. Decent size swell at the pier. No hangover but just not really feeling it. I did get caught inside many time so that's something. A cleansing if you will..

Yesterday (yes rainy and super windy) I had a craving to catch El Cap again. The buoys looked semi promising but, the drive up was looking pretty grim. Cove.. not too big, Sharks.. not even anyone out. Hey, ya know what! It turned out to be pretty good with some head high waves rolling through, and probably the least crowded I have surfed the place. Being the magical place that it is, all my troubles were erased for the entire session. But they're back.. Point being.. who knows? Maybe if I hadn't surfed those other days I wouldn't have gone yesterday. Maybe there is no point.. Sorry.