I began teaching surf P.E. at the Grauer School more than 30 years ago. Surf P.E., what a concept. Most of us coast dwellers are used to the idea of riding waves in the middle of the school day, but few people south of I-5 even believe such a thing exists. To them it must seem as realistic as Elon Musk taking a group of scouts to Mars for the afternoon.
While surfing is not generally a team activity and is not done in the confines of a classroom, it is nonetheless a great teacher. Well, surfing itself is not the main teacher here, but the medium on which it’s practiced, the ever-changing ocean.
One of the first lessons I learned was that waves show no partiality in matters of race, gender or social status. A 10-foot waves breaks equally hard on a postman’s son (me) as it does on the child of a banker. And once that wave hits, there is nobody to take you out of the impact zone. One of the main lessons I have learned as a lifetime surfer is self-reliance.
Finding a way out into the lineup when a big north swell hits is the beginning of difficulties. Getting outside requires knowledge of the ocean’s rhythms as you weave through the impact zone, dodging set waves, using rip tides to carry your forward like some aquatic escalator.
Your next problem comes in keeping your cool when city blocks of saltwater are detonating all around you. Do you paddle in, out, sideways? There are few things more terrifying in life than being caught inside by a big wave.
But surfing is not just about avoiding the ocean’s power. It’s about harnessing that power for a thrill unlike any few of us have ever experienced. Riding near the curl of a big wave is often compared to bullfighting, where the object is staying out of danger while remaining as close to it as possible.
While surfing is relatively safe and few people die doing it, being a few feet above sharp coral spikes on a 10-foot wave is as risky as it sounds.
I think I am a little ahead of myself. I have been writing of advanced classes, graduate courses that few surfers ever complete. Even so, the smaller, safer waves of Southern California have a lot to teach any surfer. And the great thing is you never quit learning.
And so, here I am, a surf instructor taking students into the ocean, some for their first time. They look to me for guidance, and I offer them everything I have learned in six decades on a surfboard.
Still, in a way, I feel like a fraud in this regard. Each time I enter the ocean, I am a student encountering a new situation in the form of a wave that has never broken before. For the other students and for me it is called physical education, but we all know that it is so much more.
