ON THE BEACH

#134 - The problem was solved by going out to the end of the rickety old pier that jutted forty yards into the surf and jumping in. The waves were almost level to the boardwalk.

Welcome to Before I Forget . .

I’m glad you are here. Thank you for your time.

ON THE BEACH

We used to go surfing here. If you could call it surfing. Most of the time it was just chop. Short rides at best. But we were the cool dudes around town (if we did say so ourselves) in our jammies and huarache sandals and boards strapped on our cartops and in pickups.

I had a 9’6” Lasardi surfboard.

The Gulf is shallow, not like on the west coast where the land rises sharp against the shore. You can feel the difference in the power of the wave.

Going over to Galveston was always a treat. My best surfing trip happened there.

While surfing, a fellow gal surfer wiped out, coming up without her bikini top. It was like a dream. I stared wide-eyed, mesmerized.

The second best was when a hurricane hit the Yucatan Peninsula. Only when a big storm or hurricane entered the Gulf would there be any real waves. These were wind-blown waves that travel great distances.

It was a 45-minute ride to the gulf. We could tell from five miles away that the surf was up. With the pounding of the shoreline, a mist rose high in the air.

The waves were huge. To us anyway. Seven, eight, maybe ten feet high. They crashed farther off the shore than we had ever seen or been. The collapsed waves at shoreline were almost impossible to paddle through.

The problem was solved by going out to the end of the rickety old pier that jutted forty yards into the surf and jumping in. The waves were almost level to the boardwalk. We avoided the turbulence near the beach. Still, we had a way to go to set up for catching a wave.

What a joy it was, riding real waves. We’d ride and then turn back before entering the crazy mix near the shore.

There was a rip tide that, if we wiped out, which was often enough, carried us west a hundred yards before we knew it. Getting ourselves and our boards together again (we weren’t tethered back then) and back to the pier was a time-consuming endeavor. I was glad I was a good swimmer.

We jokingly called the beach “Dung Beach”, as free-range cattle left their mark all over.

We surfed through the winter months. We had no wetsuits; we stayed in the water until preparing to catch a wave. The water was warmer than the air. Tidal pools on the beach were sometimes frozen.

Once, while sitting on my board waiting for the next set, I sensed something behind me.

I turned to see what I took at first to be a manatee cruising just below my board’s skeg. But that didn’t make sense as we were far from its native waters. It wasn’t a dolphin, we didn’t see any that day. Then I thought it was a manta ray. More likely it was a skate.

However, sharks were known to cruise the shoreline. If it had wanted me, my dangling legs would have been an easy chomp. It scared me. I lay prone on my board, paddled ashore, and took a break for a while.

A few years previous, a man was surf fishing waist deep near our location when he felt something hit his leg. He didn’t pay any attention to it until he said he felt a bit weak. Upon heading ashore to rest, he discovered his left calf muscle was missing. He’d been hit by a shark.

All this was a long time ago. Now I was back at the same beach, but the pier, and the cattle, were gone.

I woke to the sound of thunder and lightning. Lightning traveled through the thunderheads that stood like a rank of oncoming soldiers across the southern expanse stretching from the still dark west to the predawn east.

Though the sun was minutes away from dawning, the sun’s rays lit the white cloud tops of the burgeoning thunderclouds and filtered down rose-pink and ever-darkening hues to the base of the rain heavy clouds.

The sea lay almost lake calm and at times mirrored the storm clouds in the distance. The surface resembled a form of fractal art.

Hundreds and hundreds of sea gulls and terns were at rest or were already hunkered down in anticipation of the storm.

I let Odie, my Rhodesian Ridgeback, out of the van and he took off at a run toward the barely breaking shore waves.

He made a pass the through the gulls and terns as he ran. They lifted up and hovered a few moments while Odie passed under them and then settled down again looking like they were doing “the wave” at a ball game.

He stood knee-deep in the Gulf a few moments before making another pass through the birds barking and leaping at them as best he could as he ran. He broke off midrun and started digging in the sand.

My weather app said it was 74 degrees already and the storm’s arrival was half an hour away.

We were camped on the beach just above the high-water line. We had the beach to ourselves.

I settled into making my first cup of coffee and oatmeal made possible by my upgraded solar system. 600 watts of solar panels on the roof with a battery/generator and inverter that could now support the power needed to run the microwave.

I could now recharge my cell and laptop and power my small fridge as well as the internet and lighting. My cell’s hotspot served to connect me to the internet. I was set for all I needed to live comfortably off-grid.

Odie was occupied on the beach with his digging and bird chasing.

While finishing breakfast, I felt the first rush of wind from the coming rainstorm. The water’s surface had changed to rough windblown whitecaps.

The birds were gone.

The downdraft rapidly cooled the air, dropping the temperature ten degrees. Big, scattered raindrops pelted the windshield and roof and pockmarked the sand.

I whistled for Odie and he came in in a rush jumping through the open side door into the van. Before I could get a towel around him, he gave himself a good shake. I would have a job of it cleaning it up.

Hail started falling. Small ice crystals grew to pea-size to mothball and larger.

My concern was for the roof panels and windshield though both were strong enough to withstand most hailstorms. I had experienced a couple other hailstorms recently.

But the hail stopped, replaced by torrents of rain and buffeting winds.

In ten minutes, the storm was spent with a blue-sky morning above and the remains of broken clouds moving north.

The birds had returned. Odie made his mad dash through them on his way to the once again calm waters. I checked the roof panels for damage, there was none, and started wiping down the mess Odie made.

On the horizon, a fresh line of thunderstorms was building and heading our way.

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See you next week, my friends. : )