Wipe-out

When learning to surf, a skill worth mastering is how to hold your breath for an extended period of time when pushed deep below the surface. You remain calm, you watch the wave pass, and check for any other surfers who’ve spun out of control above in the waves wake. You have to believe that you will always surface, or else panic sets in and your shit will go awry.

For the last week, I’ve been waiting for the turbulence to pass before coming up for air.

When I was in Hawaii in 2003 to witness my parents get married for the second time (long story), I learned how waves can differ immensely. I duck dived a wave on the north shore, only to discover that the coral reefs have something to say about wave wussies. A chunk of my right foot and a large portion of my pride was left out in the water that day.

Our third roomie moved out last week. Yes, there is way more to this story, we actually “asked” her to move out. She moved out last Thursday after eight days of sending us ridiculous emails. Actually, the movers Mary and I hired moved her out on Thursday because that was the breaking point. In the last week we had to arrange with the owners to get new carpet in her room. Her dog defecated, daily, on the $55 a yard Norwegian white wool carpet that was in her room. Did you know that most carpet costs $20 a yard, yet Norwegian white wool costs $55 a yard? Originally, we hoped that she would move out by the first of February. But then we bought her out by giving her more than her share of the rent back. If she were a wave, before reaching the shore, she would have rolled out in all different directions in a current of crazy. No “high tide” or “low tides”, just a sea of f’ing crazy.

I’m in a hotel in Orange County (not to be referred to as “the OC”). This is, of course, where I am from. I was born at Hoag Hospital, and raised up and down the coast of The County. I flew in and met my Dad at the ‘buck because it just so happened that he was getting his afternoon green tea latte (birds of a feather…). I had dinner near South Coast Plaza, which is where my Mom worked when she was in high school and where we shopped when I was a kid. I’m driving the rental car down roads I’ve driven down for years. By the way, never buy a car from a rental company. Roll a few miles with me in my hot Hertz and you’ll know what I mean.

I just started reading Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs by Chuck Klosterman. He starts the book by writing:

There are two ways to look at life. Actually, that’s not accurate; I suppose there are thousands of ways to look at life. But I tend to dwell on two of them. The first view is that nothing stays the same and that nothing is inherently connected, and that the only driving force in anyone’s life is entropy. The second is that everything pretty much stays the same (more or less) and that everything is completely connected, even if we don’t realize it.

I of course, adamantly believe, the latter. Everything is connected, everything.

Fortunately, this doesn’t mean that we must remain connected to certain things. Like the 452 cds that I sold this weekend on Craigslist. Or, like our old roomie and her un-trained, neglected, malnourished dog who’s been removed from the lease and who has a key that won’t open our front door.

I am confident that my eye can assess the surf conditions much more accurately now. I’m never paddling out into a sea of crazy again.