In waiting for a wave, in sitting out there between sets, bad thoughts, obsessive thoughts, will surface, but while actually riding, while standing up and searching for that rhythm, no matter how awful the day I’m having my mind is clean and clear and blank and therefore content. I have never, not ever, had a conscious thought, good, bad or indifferent, while in the act of riding a wave. I needed that purity, that vacuum.

            For the first time in my life I armed myself for a trip to the beach.