#hoboblues

This past week on a vacation to the Outer Banks, I found out that I am a surfer. It's not what I expected to find out, and I found out nonetheless.

I have long used metaphors of riding waves and surfing what life brings in personal and professional settings. Like so many other instances, when I note similarities between ways of thinking in one context with ways of thinking in another, I feel the need to explore them further. After an afternoon spent riding waves on a boogie board, I started to realize that there might be something to trying out surfing in physical space.

Below are some life lessons learned from the experience of that realization, paired with a collection of my favorite scenes featuring Paul Rudd as surf instructor Kunu from Forgetting Sarah Marshall.

Also, to borrow a sentiment from Dave Eggers’ A Heartbreaking Work Of Staggering Genius, this post is not about surfing.

Oh man, you know- they won't change that flyer. That was my mainland name- my Hawaiian name is Kunu!

Once I realized that I might be a surfer, I noticed the next day that Kitty Hawk Sports had a half-dozen boards available for rental. Curious, I walked into the store and asked the clerk how he would recommend a mainlander like me learn to surf.

Mark pointed me toward Jason, his teammate and an experienced surfer in his own right. While finishing the crust of his pizza lunch, Jason walked me through the uncomplicated process of signing up for lessons. Handing me a flyer, he empowered me to make the call once I figured out whether or not surfing lessons were in my future.

After mulling it over, I made the call that afternoon to sign up for lessons for the next morning. Suddenly, I had three new team members- those two clerks from the store, as well as the customer service representative (from Cherry Hill, New Jersey, I might add) who helped me secure the reservation.

That evening, I went back to thank those two new team members and ran into another surfer I had met earlier that day. I shared with him my plan for a lesson spurred on by my boogie-boarding experience, to which he and his friend chuckled. He assured me that after surfing, I would never pick up a boogie board again.

Given that I'd only picked up a boogie board for the first time two days prior, such a loss was worrisome to me, though I was intrigued enough to find out if it was true.

[Kunu] means Chuck. I plugged it into a database. There's a thing you can go on on the Internet, you just type in your name, and it just says it.

As it turns out, my Hawaiian name is Bane Kai. I have resisted the urge to find out what it means, because, to follow Kunu’s lead, to me #BaneKaiMeansTony.

Okay, when we're out there I want you to ignore your instincts. I'm gonna be your instincts. Kunu will be your instincts.

This is the beginning to one of my favorite scenes in this favorite of movies. The feedback cycle that Kunu offers Peter as he learns to surf has long been a go-to clip to share with coaches and teachers who are looking to provide clear feedback to those they help to learn a new skill.

Before beginning my own lesson, I had used an analogy between surfing (what I had never done) and snowboarding (which I had done before). In my head, I had already begun to learn how to surf by thinking of it as “carving into liquid snow” (an analogy about many have made endless fun of me).

What I learned on the water: that association was not helpful. #notevenalittlebit #notevenatall

I learned that I needed to let my instructor be my instincts such that I could unlearn all I had tried to teach myself. Thankfully, I had three great instructors, each of which was very different in their approach and style.

Don't do anything. Don't try to surf. Don't do it! The less you do, the more you do. Let's see you pop up. Pop up!

While we were on the beach practicing our pop-ups, instructor Max used the analogy that catching a wave is like catching a train- that one needs to match its speed before you'd ever be able to catch it.

Max’s approach on the water: to get you lined up into a wave and then give a slight push such that you have to paddle in order to match the speed of the wave. He made catching the wave and popping up into two separate experiences.

That's not it at all. Do less. Get down and try less. Do it again. Pop up.

While helpful in the long term, it's safe to say that Max’s approach wasn't as helpful to me in the initial stages of my #tenhanging. I got very used to the taste of salt water after those first few rounds.

Nope, too slow. Do less. Pop up.

Zach on the other hand offered a little more direction. He always gave a big first push though well in advance of the arrival of the wave. Some paddling was still required prior to popping up, though not as much as with Max.

You're doing too much, do less. Pop down. Pop up now. Stop. Get down, get down there. Remember, don't do anything. Nothing.

Transitioning to Zach’s approach from Max’s was tricky. I was doing way too much paddling and not enough living in the wave. I needed to do less paddling, and more popping up.

Well, you've gotta do more than that, because you're just laying- right now it looks like you're boogie boarding. Just do it. Feel it. POP UP!

I spent most of my time on the water with Ralph. As a fellow educator with experience in AVID, he took great care to identify a #Goldilocks wave, and also to provide the initial push so as to match the wave’s speed. All I would have to do with Ralph was pop right up.

Yeah! That wasn't quite it, but we’re gonna figure it out out there.

Ralph was big on prepping for success, and also on providing clear feedback on what he saw me do as I tried to pop up. He seemed to recognize that every wave I tried to catch was an opportunity for me to learn a small part of the larger skill, and gave actionable points on what he saw such that I could make sense of what I was experiencing.

Let's go surfin’, c’mon. Everybody's learning how, c’mon. The weather outside is weather!

This line was going around and around in my head while out in the water, which is ironic in its own right. 

As a former and forever physics teacher, I noticed that I was living in my head while out in the water. Where most saw waves and wind, I saw oscillating surface waves. Balancing and counterbalancing forces. Vectors as far as the mind’s eye could see.

What I needed to remind myself: The weather outside is weather. My environment was telling me what I needed to hear, and I did not need to analyze it. I needed to live in it if I wanted to be successful in this venture.

I quit wearing a watch when I moved out here. My cell phone has a clock on it, so I don't really need it.

Out on the water, time went on for days. I knew we had but 90 minutes for our lesson, and I noticed myself worrying about when that last wave would come upon us.

Of course, all of my time pieces were back in the car, and I had no real way of knowing how long I still had in this experience aside from my instructors’ direction. I learned to trust that they would tell me when it was time to come into shore, and until then I had the grace to live in that moment. It was an exhilarating if not offputting realization.

I don't really believe in age or numbers, you know- I don't...I mean, if you had to put a number on it, I guess I'd be...forty...four?

I am no longer anywhere near as young as I feel, and my body had no trouble reminding me. I came to realize that my body did not do what I expected it to do, because frankly I'm no longer as spry as I once was. (And I was never really all that spry to begin with, #sotheresthat.)

Even now, days later, my ribs are still sore from pulling myself up on that board. It's a soreness I look back on fondly, and a soreness all the same.

You need to get back on that board is what you need to do.

I was not as successful at riding waves as I had hoped, at least not at first. However, I was nowhere near as bad at it as I had expected to be, either.

With each wave I rode, I learned something new about how to ride the next one. Partnered with the feedback of my instructors, the models of my peers, and the endless supply of waves, I kept getting back on that board.

You've gotta just pull yourself up by your wetsuit, get back on that board- hey, look, man, if you were attacked by a shark, are you going to give up surfing?

While in the moment of that lesson, I was out further in the ocean than I ever remember being. Normally, such an untethered connection would make me nervous. Concerned for all that lies beneath the surface and beyond the horizon. 

And yet on this day, I had no fear. Maybe it was because of the safety I felt in being a part of this troupe of learners. Maybe it was the naïveté of an overarching feeling of, “This is a sanctioned lesson- what could happen badly?” Either way, even if I had been attacked by a great white, I don't think anything could have kept me from jumping back on that board.

Peter: I want to stand up on a wave before I leave.

Kunu: I don't think you're ready yet, man.

Peter: I’M READY TO RIDE GIANTS, KUNU.

Kunu: I think you're ready.

I was determined to get up on a wave. I was ready to ride giants. And in some ways, I was successful. By the end of the lesson, the closest I got to riding a wave was on one knee, cruising along at the speed of the current below me.

In the end, I was not yet ready to trust my body and the board enough to pop all the way up. That said, the experience taught me that I could do it. That I am in fact a surfer.

I am forever grateful to my new teammates at Outer Banks Surf School, Kitty Hawk Kites, and Sam Sykes Media for the opportunity to learn about myself through this experience, and look forward to the next chance I get to step back into that liquid.

The seasoned surfer I met was right: I'll never touch a boogie board again.

PS As I often do, I made a collaborative playlist on Spotify to get me into the groove of this experience. You are invited to add your favorite reminders of surfing an endless supply of waves.

PPS For posterity’s sake, I guess I should record the actual lessons I learned:

Lay flat on the board, and touch the tips of your toes to the tip of the board in order to get centered and balanced.

Paddle your way past all the breakers, and look for a sand bar that carries a breaking wave a decent number of yards toward the shore.

Wait for a good wave- be patient.

When it's time to catch the wave, get to paddling. Catch it like you're catching a train- match its speed as it approaches.

Once you're in the wave, just pop up. Push your body up with your hands beneath your shoulders, swing your legs up under you, and get a wide and low center of gravity.