yesterday ~ today

yesterday i was self indulgent, and homesick - today, less self indulgent, and excited about surfing with my kin back home in 8 short weeks.
The ocean set me right tonight - i body surfed, got a bang on the head getting too close to boydy, throwing fast eddie about.

I floated

I took a few with the handplanes i have most recently made for Ed and Jackie as their going away gift, naughty, but i had to test them, they might have sunk.

And i got these two shots

dave eyeballing me and lifting the nose - i love watching dave surf, he puts the board where it needs to be, there is an economy of movement i really like.

I got the sun in the background of this one and timed it nice. Lauren, its been months since i saw her, and longer still since we have been in the water with one another, good to see her still doing it good.

my friend ed

i miss ed ~ tonight, acutely. I'm homesick, painfully. its happening more, feeling more and more lonely, missing home, the closer i get to going back.

He's the guy I first surfed with, the guy I shared the first few steps of the journey with. He gets me.

He surfs good, because he enjoys it, its visceral, its written on his face, he'll do whatever madcap scheme i had conjured up, we surfed at midnight, tangled in the fisherman's lines, we surfed waves we shouldn't.

When i surf i sometimes think of him ~ and try to tell myself to be a little more like him than me.
Moments like now, when i think about my place in the world ~ i miss him most.
I miss sitting on the roof of the car, post surf, in the dewy evening sharing stories, usually tall ones, exaggerating rides, overstating ourselves, knowing that we were(are) both rubbish! - smiling, knowing, and laughing.

We climbed big cliffs together ~ we did stupid big swings off railway bridges, in the middle of night, on old rope, climbed into water-towers to abseil ~ we should be dead ~ we drove too fast ~ we trust one another ~ he belayed my first lead - on this route:

He tried to rescue me, and eventually did when i got stuck halfway down a bridge swinging in the span in the middle of the night.

im lucky to have him as a friend, even if he is on the other side of the world...

and i'll surf with him in 9 weeks.

resin - wonderful stuff

two artists:

sean nettleton - glasser supreme

 buy your next wave riding implement from him

the brown shed

and resin in a differnt way - beautiful

Dawn

A semi secluded spot not a million miles from home- not quite doing it this morning

more and less

from the jai division

pommie gets a couple

a fun day, low expections - bigger payoffs

the wife

plays some mean totem tennis

So, as a prize for being the single most awesome person i know, im shaping her a board, a board she will most likely ride twice, but even so, its another excuse to shape.

 here is is...

The blog has been getting confessional, but thats ok. There is thoughts in all these images.

Surfing is a funny thing, such pleasure, sometimes, such demand, ego, personality, its oftentimes hard to reconcile with myself, in action, enough is always enough.

pond

I am reading Thoreau again - Walden Pond - and i as sit here, hokey, on the porch swing, comtemplating the unfathomable, i am reassured that the act is itself is enough.

The new year commenced with a surf - and i was different within it - selfish almost, not greedy, just alone amongst the crowd, the the pressure I have been feeling fell away somewhat. Today, I was involved again but moments shone through like glimmers of sunshine through threadbare curtains, breaks in the cloud. - there is space, everywhere, but the eyes deceive, you dont need eyes to see, you need vision.

"To be awake is to be alive." Walden, Henry David Thoreau