You know that trendy, annoying phrase that a lot of the kids are saying these days:
“_________ was a movie” ?
We’ll let me tell you something; Summertime in Huntington Beach could be a movie. People have no fucking clue what’s going on, but they like to think and act like they do. From July 3rd up until school is running again sometime in September, it is madness around here. Last Friday night I walked by a group of at least 6 kids that were all (at some point) in the event at the US Open, sitting on Main Street, each one with a bag in their hand concealing some kind of alcoholic beverage. I know for sure that a few of them were not of legal drinking age, and I also know for sure that HBPD would have loved to cite every single one of them for drinking in public.
This morning in the span of about a 2 hour surf session, I witnessed at least three rules get broken. This pesky little grom was in a great spot to go left for one of the better waves I had seen in the morning. I’m paddling back out from a ride. He calls off someone, loudly, and quickly falls while getting to his feet, sending himself and his board tumbling down the small, slopey face and into a crowd of 3 or 4 paddling surfers. Ouch. The Boy Who Cried Wolf.
I almost said something to him, but I decided not to. Instead I made sure to paddle closer to the pier and sit just inside of him. Great timing too, because here comes another little nugget. But have a look at this little shit – he’s gonna snake me – he’s gonna go isn’t he? Well, me too. I basically mid-face bottom turn and somehow, some way miss the nose of his board as he is trying to get up to his feet. I don’t know if he was falling already, if I caused the fall, not sure what happened but I surfed right around him, and into an oncoming circus of at least 7 surfers paddling in my line. The kid went down, and that’s the last of my worries. This was literally the best wave I had caught all day, it had two nice sections on it. I had enough space to get a bit of a speed check, kind of a down carve, and I was eyeing up a nice closeout section. If I go for a snap, I am dropping back in straight on top of some kid. If I straighten out, I have maybe a 5 foot gap between a couple of foamboards. I have a lot of speed. What is the move?
I go for a bit of a floater/hit thing. I had to avoid this kid who is paddling straight up the face. I basically go over and around the top of him, and now I’m falling back in with the whitewater, trying to get back out in front of it. I have not much control as I’m bouncing around in the turbulence, and now I’m quickly approaching some older woman who has her longboard at her hip, ready to bail. Of course she bails it, and I’m working so hard not to lose balance and fall, and also trying to angle around her and her log, all through this bumpy whitewash. I navigate just, I mean just around her, but there’s her board. Before I run it straight over I bail out, trying to lighten my feet and direct the board down the line. I come up and my board is flipped over on top of hers, basically just wax to wax. Here comes the next wave, and we both miss getting ran over by some dude riding a foam board by like 5 or 6 feet. Sketchy.
I caught one more mid-bar right after retrieving my board, and I had enough. As I’m walking up the beach and having a look at how flat Southside is, I see some older gentleman walking in my direction. I thought he was going to ask me about that shenanigans, or maybe a conditions check, water temp question, but then just behind me I hear, “did you see that wave??”. Here comes that little shithead. Must be his grandpa or something. Maybe an old father. “Did you see that wave?!?”, panting, running up the beach he unsolicitedly begs. That makes Two Broken Rules in a few short minutes for this grom. Rule 44 which we mentioned, and now Rule 9. He is on my ‘watch out’ list – the list of people that I watch out for in the lineup.
Now I’m in the parking lot and it’s typical summer Huntington Beach shit. I can expect no less from these beach going visitors who have no clue, no etiquette, no morals, and no Respec for us surfing kind, but I am quickly approached by the RuleBreaker101, the sole reason and purpose I started writing the Unwritten Rulebook of Surfing in the first place;
“Hey boss, you wouldn’t happen to be leaving, would you?”
You just followed me through the parking lot to my car. I am dripping wet pulling off my wetsuit, I just set my board down, unlocked and opened my car –
“Nah, I’m meeting someone down here. Sorry.”
Chaos.
Cheers,
hwilsin
Drew Stanfield