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Destiny
by
Michael Shipp
It was destiny.
I spotted the garage sale sign only because I had to turn around and go back home for my forgotten wet suit. Dawn Patrol would go on without me. I spotted the long board propped against the garage from the end of the block and knew. It was all I could do to keep from flooring it. I parked my truck in front of the driveway and myself in front of the board. It was an early O'Neill. If I told you how early you wouldn't believe me. Like the big fish that gets away you try to describe to doubtful friends. I had a hard time believing my own eyes, but there it was. Number 122. I tried not to drool and fought back the biggest shit eating grin never seen.
If not for a little left over ancient paraffin on the deck I would have thought that it never touched water. It was flawless. Mint. Not a hint of a ding to be seen anywhere. And it looked like it had never seen the sun. Under decades of dust the green boat resin seemed to glow as fresh as the day it was poured. I fought the giggles bubbling from my gut and tried to put on my best poker face. I don't own one. I thumbed through a box of unwanted albums to calm the inner storm. Herb Alpert, Petula Clark, Mel Torme, Lawrence Welk. I never saw the old guy walk up with a box of books.
"Morning young man."
At forty-seven I took it as a compliment. He looked to be twice my age. I guess everything is relative. To the kids on the Point I more than qualify as an old geezer.
"Good morning sir."
"I didn't expect anybody this early. I didn't advertise." "Early bird gets the worm."
"You going fishing?"
"On my way to catch a couple waves.", I said.
He looked at me, then my truck and the beat up board on the racks and smiled.
We both looked at the board.
"How much you want for her?", I blurted. I was planning a negotiating strategy Donald Trump would be proud of.
"How's fifty bucks sound?"
I almost fainted. I was floored. It was worth an easy thousand to a collector. I wanted the board, but didn't think I could do it without being honest. Not that I'm a saint, but I wouldn't feel right about trying to rip off the old guy. Especially on a thirty pound board that could deal out instant karma in heavy surf.
I didn't want to be a chump. "It's worth more than fifty.", I said.
"How much?", he asked.
"A lot."
"How much is it worth to you?"
"I can scrape up a couple hundred, but it's still worth more than that?"
The old guy looked at the board and I was afraid he was going to cry.
"That's my son's board. I can still remember the day he bought her. He was grinning from ear to ear. It was his high school graduation present from his mom and I. He absolutely loved the water." "You make it sound like he doesn't surf anymore.", I said.
"He flew over the pond and bought the farm."
"What?", I heard what he said, but it didn’t register.
"He was killed in Viet Nam a week before his nineteenth birthday."
Now I knew I couldn't do it.
"You'd better hold onto that board. It's an old O'Neill. It might be worth a thousand bucks."
The old guy looked at me assessing the situation.
"I appreciate your honesty. This isn't about money. I don't need the money and I don't want some prick to buy it and hang it on the wall. I want somebody to ride it. That's what my son would have wanted. It's time. You can have it for two hundred."
"I'm your man.", it came from the heart. I fished out the twenty I had in my pocket. "Here's a deposit. I'll drive home and get my check book."
"Take the board and pay me the rest when you can.", he said.
I stood there with my mouth open and tongue hanging out like a rock fish pulled from the deep wondering what had happened. I couldn't breath.
"You don't know nothing about me.", I said.
"I know you didn't try to cheat an old man, who doesn't know shit from shinola. Take the board, but you have to promise me to ride it."
"I'm on it. It's a deal.", I gave him the twenty and extended my hand. We shook and I could feel him start to tremble and shake. I loaded the board and drove away with a wave as he watched. Looking in the mirror from the end of the block I could tell the old guy was crying. I owed him and his son in ways I couldn't and wouldn't want to explain. His son would have been my age. He went to Nam. I didn't. I wasn't going to go. No way in hell. But I wasn't going to run to Canada. Too cold. After graduation I was going to take a prolonged vacation in Baja. Surf my ass off to come back home and face jail or whatever. That was Plan A. But I didn't have to implement it. The luck of the draw gave me a high draft number in the lottery. Somehow even today it doesn't seem fair. I owed him and his old man and I didn't even know his name.
I drove over the Hill and down into Town, took Ocean Avenue to East Cliff Drive and drove to Pleasure Point. I bought a bar of Sex Wax at Jimmie's Superette and lucked into a parking spot at the end of 36th next to Jack O'Neill house. The Man himself. As I waxed the board surfers gathered around my truck like a pod of otters gazing at the last abalone on the coast.
Ronnie D wanted to knock on Jacks’ front door and see if he was home. "I bet he'll buy it on the spot. Put it up in his shop on 41st." "He's already got a dozen hanging from the ceiling, he don't need another one.", I zipped up my suit and said nothing more and started for the stairs down the cliffs.
"Wait.", Ronnie yelled, "Let's just go over and say hi. He likes to check out the old ones. Shit, who knows, maybe he even shaped this one?"
"Later, right now I got a promise to keep." I walked down the stairs, ran up the low tide beach, paddled to outside First Peak and waited my turn. Our turn.
The surface of the water was as smooth as glass. The wind was far away vacationing in Hawaii. To God it looked like a pond to me it looked like The Ocean. Everything is relative. The swell was head high with occasional set waves well over head. I took the choice waves and rode them to the beach and paddled back for more. And nobody said anything. Not even the shortboarders who sit on the inside bowl. That day everybody knew; I was the Man on the Board.
Soul Arch, Quasimoto, Iron Cross. Strictly Old School. Too Cool for words. I surfed possessed and not alone. I was surfing tandem. I surfed for hours until my arms were as limp as seaweed on a minus tide exposed reef baking in the sun. I smelled like it too. I was cooking inside the black suit. I barely had the strength left to struggle out of the top. I didn't have enough left to carry the heavy board up the cliffs but my soul was flooded with stoke. I waited awhile at the Dirt Farm, a nook in the cliffs where the locals hang out in the sun and out of the wind.
'Monterey' Jack, (not to be confused with Mr. O'Neill), was waiting at my truck with seven crisp one hundred dollar bills.
"She ain't for sell.", I said.
"Sell it to me. You know I'll take good care of the board. You'll just lose it on a high tide someday and it'll wash up on the rocks.", he didn't let up.
"Isn't that what its all about?", I said..
"I'll hang it on the wall like it deserves. That's a piece of history. You'll just surf it and beat the shit out of it."
"That’s the plan."
I drove back over the Hill into the Valley; the 'Pit', determined to pay the old guy a thousand dollars no matter how long it took. But by the time I drove past Los Gatos I knew I wouldn't. Couldn't. My draft number was one hundred and twenty something. I drove back to his house and board under arm knocked on the front door.
He answered the door, "What's the matter? Don't you like the board?"
"I love her, but she's not mine. Never will be. This is where she belongs.", I said.
"Didn't you ride it?" "I rode her hard and now you can put her away wet. Your kid must have been one hell of a surfer because the board still remembers what to do.", I started away.
"Wait! Your money."
I grinned from ear to ear, "Keep it. I got my money's worth."
And more.
author is michael shipp.