Saved by the Waves

I’d been surfing all my life, then I stopped. Feeling hesitant and frail after a health crisis, I confined myself to swimming laps inshore of Suis, my neighborhood surf spot off Diamond Head.

My surfer friends were concerned.

“I’ll go surfing with you; when can you go?” Debbie asked.

“Go get your board, you need to surf,” said Boogie Pete. “It’s who you are.”

He was right. When I started surfing again, five months ago, I realized how close I’d come to losing touch with my true self.

My lifelong ardor for the sea began early, when my grandfather dipped me in the warm shallows at 6 months old. When I was 13, a posse of neighborhood boys taught me to board surf.

For a plump, unathletic bookworm, the sensation of weightlessness and speed was liberating. I learned to read waves, winds, clouds, currents and tides. I delighted in spotting seabirds, turtles, fish, dolphins, seals and whales. I learned to take calculated risks, launching myself over watery cliffs and driving under the lips of waves and back and forth over glassy walls. I learned how to fall, fail and keep trying.

Soon, I’d lost the baby fat. More than 50 years later, having undergone breast cancer surgery, radiation, chemotherapy and treatment for cardiac arrhythmia, I’d lost 20 pounds and was struggling to regain weight, not to mention confidence.

It didn’t help that I’m now on blood thinners. My cardiologist warned I could hemorrhage in a surfing accident. But my oncologist and electrophysiologist, citing the interdependence of mental, emotional and physical health, urged me to get back on the water. “Just be careful, and go with a friend,” the electrophysiologist, a surfer, told me.

By March, when Debbie finally coaxed me back out, I hadn’t surfed for a year and a half. My paddling muscles had atrophied. My legs were bone thin. Neuropathy in my feet made it difficult to balance.

But I caught a wave, and, when I stood, I could feel my board under my feet. “Yay, great wave, you’re the same as ever!” Debbie cried. Not quite. It was much harder than before. I switched to my son’s 9-foot, round-nosed longboard, which paddled more quickly into waves, allowing me more time to get to my feet.

I discovered the lineup was a kinder place. “Welcome back, good to see you, been a long time!” the regular surfers said. Many who’d once battled me for waves smiled, pulled back and urged, “Go, go, go!” Kimo and Paul paddled out with me and escorted me back to shore. Pete, his sturdy frame encased in a white rash guard, floated close by on his boogie board like a big mochi in a vast blueberry iced tea.

I realized I’m an integral member of a pod.

Once, I accidentally dropped in on a mean-looking regular in wraparound shades. But he gave me space. “Go anytime,” he said later, with the nicest smile.

Still, even on the 9-footer, I often couldn’t stand up quickly enough on a steep, fast wave and ended up on my belly.

“Maybe go longer,” an acquaintance said.  His own board measured a trendy 5 feet.

I went back to my shortboard the next day.

“Woo-hoo!” Debbie cheered. “You’re back on your regular board, taking off on big drops!”

Sometimes I’ll get a dozen waves in a session, sometimes only one. I’ve enjoyed many long, soaring rides. I’ve also been sucked over the falls and pounded.

But it’s OK. Offshore, the anxieties of life on land wash away, leaving me unencumbered and free. Surfing demands living in the moment, fully engaged and alert, and nowadays I’m meditating on the changing beauty of my surroundings rather than frantically chasing and keeping score of waves. “You look so much younger! And buff,” my son said.

It’s been a rejuvenating restart tempered by the perspective of age.

Mindy Pennybacker is the author of Surfing Sisterhood Hawai‘i: Wāhine Reclaiming the Waves. Her writing has appeared in National Wildlife, The New York Times, The Atlantic, Sierra and The Nation, among many other publications.