Window of Opportunity—Missed

Once again, I've had a day without surf. Since I didn't have to be at school until the afternoon, I figured I'd hit the beach this morning. Luckily, I also took my skates. I got to my break only to find it closing out in big, furious bursts of energy. I knew there was no way I was going out in that. Almost no one was out. One of the things I've learned over the last few years is if the parking lot at the spot is virtually empty, that means the surf is bad. Once again, the parking lot didn't look good. Some of the regulars were there. But there were no smiles. I didn't get the impression that anyone had fun out there today. I didn't even bother to ask. I saw a few people from my crew standing on the wall, looking at the surf. Then our local surf family—surfing parents and beach baby toddler—walked up from the wrong direction. Usually, they come from the parking lot and their boards are on top of the car. Today, they came from the direction of the playground. That was enough for me. Someone suggested Sunset might be good. Now, see, that made it hard. My class wasn't until two. However, I still needed to make photocopies and finish my notes for today's lecture. I hemmed and hawed for about five minutes, thinking I should really do a quick workout and then think about schoolwork. Guess what I did? I jumped in the car and headed for Sunset. I told myself I'd only surf for 30 minutes. Then I changed it to 40 minutes. Then I decided I only needed two good waves and I'd get out. I went back and forth like this for awhile. By that point, I wasn't really thinking about today's lecture. I just wanted to surf. So, happily north I headed. All was well when I first got on PCH. After three minutes of driving, the traffic came to a dead stop. That's never a good sign. When it didn't really start moving after five minutes, I took that as my cue. I made one of my infamous illegal U-turns and headed back to my spot. I skated. And I was pissed too! Pissed to the point of whining. Is this what surfing does to grown-ass people? Turns them into big, whining babies? Anyway, I took a nice little skate north. I'm glad I'd turned the car around when I had. I found out there'd been a traffic accident on PCH. Had I not turned around, I probably would have still been sitting on PCH. If nothing else, I got a good workout in. Even when I can't surf, I try to do something. I stay motivated by telling myself that the workouts I do outside of the water will only make me stronger when I get back in the water. I don't know if it's true. It doesn't really matter. All that I care about is maintaining my fitness for surfing. That beautiful wax job hasn't even seen the water. Well, I can wait. Now that the first week of school is behind me (and I feel comfortable with my students), I feel I've given enough of my energy to the students and now I want to give it back to me (through surfing). I suppose the surfing will have to wait until the water cleanses itself after the rains.