Ready to Leave

My husband and I are starting to give serious thought to the idea of leaving L.A. After 42 years, minus the college years spent out of state and a half a year in Holland, I have had just about enough of this place. The dilemma we're facing now is that I'm afraid to stay here and my husband is afraid to leave (thinking a move to an unknown place—and he's a native Los Angeleno too—could leave us as dissatisfied as we are now). The only good thing I can say about this place is that I like being able to be at the beach within 20 minutes. That's it. The schools suck. The race relations suck. The quality of life sucks. Mean people suck. The crowds everywhere you look suck! The fact that I can't find a decent job sucks! But where would we go? It's not like we can pick up and move to another city or town without giving it serious thought. We have a child, a brown skinned child. I don't want him to be the only anything anywhere. I've lived that life (at times) and it's not much fun. So, for now, I think about moving to a place with decent places to surf, good schools, and a good amount of diversity. Snow is out. We're from L.A. Drastic climate changes aren't going to cut it. The South is out . . . because it's the South and it seems like a foreign country to black folks raised on the West Coast. What's left?

Okay, there's a contest at a local break on Saturday. Somehow, CYT talked me into doing it. So, today's session was all about getting to know this break. I've never surfed there before. She learned to surf there. I remember running in the sand from my home break during the winters, stopping at this one to watch the surfing, and then running back. I always thought I'd never be good enough to surf there. It's summer now, thus the waves are relatively tame, nothing like they are during the winter. The session was good. I spent quite a bit of time watching the waves, trying to get a feel for how this place breaks and how surfers approach the waves there. Then I started surfing. The one thing I realize now is that the fear of going to the nose is gone. I went there several times today, but couldn't quite pull the rides off. My best attempt on the nose was while going backside. I think that's harder to do because it's harder to watch the wave with your back turned. I couldn't quite watch my foot and watch the wave at the same time and in I went. Nonetheless, it was a good session. I'm not worried or nervous about the contest. I think I'm more excited by the idea of getting a surf contest t-shirt.