Neptune’s Lair

Smacked in the head with a board, mouth full of water, seaweed dreadlocks, I wash up ignominiously on shore. Why did I agree to try surfing anyways? This morning I was dry, fit, confident of my athletic prowess, somewhat boastful. Surfing: anyone could do it. This morning I was not a ragdoll of the ocean, a slave to the waves… a noob. Now, once again, I face the ocean, ancient and timeless, brooding, more powerful than I had envisioned, without conscience, holding all the forces of Neptune arrayed against me. Daunted, pride damaged, ego up in the wind, spitting out chunks of seaweed, I nevertheless paddle back out, sit up on my board, and survey the incoming scene. A few short seconds later, I find myself once again washed up on the beach gasping for breath, combing sand out of my hair, hoping the strands will be salvageable by the end of today’s session. I take a final ounce of motivation in an attempt to recapture a shred of my dignity and paddle back out, my arms slicing through the water occasionally tossing aside a bit of seaweed or splashing myself, the cool sea waters creeping up my wetsuit, the taste of salt in my mouth, a dull pain starting to ignite in my lower shoulder blades and back muscles. A wave rolls towards me, a solid wall of water, inevitable, ominous. Am I the predator and it the prey, or is it in turn the hunter honing in on its victim. I spin the board around in preparation and brace myself for the worse as the momentum of the wave nears, small eddies appearing as my arms quickly rip through the water straining to accelerate to meet the wave as it bears down upon me, a dark shadow looming at the edge of my vision. The board lifts with the energy, the chakra of the wave, an uncontrollable mount, as suddenly my board and I are caught in a vice, an uncontrollable grip, and held forward. It is all wrong. The nose of my board submarines, the tail flips up propelling me to projectile through the air in a graceful arc, a sickening arc, a rainbow of the sea, an artist in a flop. Once again, I pick myself up from the beach, outcast from the ocean, rejected by Neptune, unwanted by creatures with tails. I haul my body up the beach all while I tug the sticky blubber of my wetsuit from skin, the material unwilling to detach itself, unwilling to leave a source of warmth, the exertion enough to have me seeing stars, and I stand in amazement as I find my bikini bottom down one leg of the wetsuit. I turn my back to the ocean and walk away, copious seawater in my sinuses, a fair measure, a beach's worth really, of sand in my bathing suit, souvenirs of my failure, reminders of work yet to be done should one want to master the surf. One day, I become stronger, more adept, more cunning, wiser in the waves of those who ride the surf. Neptune welcomes me to the sea.

I'm the one with the blue board