It’s simply beyond the pale to bear witness day after day (ad nauseam) to the monstrous revenge campaign committed by Israel (funded & supported by the United States) against innocent civilians trapped in a squalid concentration camp surrounded by murderous, racist bullies and thugs and remain silent.

Pull the plug on Israeli occupation, apartheid, fascism, colonialism, and genocide. Immediately.

The tired old line (a fiction) that poor Israel "has a right to defend itself" is a hackneyed fallacy. Israel is nothing more than a modern postwar colony invented by racist Zionists and otherwise authorized by the UN at the behest of the United States and Britain — precisely because they (and Western powers) felt guilty for not doing much about the Holocaust.

American Jews (e.g., AIPAC) extort the world on this guilt and allow — indeed encourage — Israel to treat the Arab Palestinians in ways comparable — and equally as contemptible — as their former German Nazi persecutors. Where's the sense in that? There's none. It’s appalling and disgusting.

Moreover, stealing and occupying land that clearly belongs to someone else — the Arab Palestinians — is both illegal and immoral. The Palestinian response, however militant, is altogether rational — not “terrorism” but armed resistance. What happened on October 7 was essentially a jail break. What else does one expect of a captive, abused, desperate and hopeless prisoner of war trying to escape?

Furthermore, Israel's experiment in so-called "Jewish democracy" has failed miserably. It began with (and was sustained by) theft and brutal apartheid and has finally degenerated into genocide subsidized by the United States — which is complicit (and rightly condemned) for its unconditional aid and abetting mass murder. How can Israel call itself a “democracy” when it denies the indigenous inhabitants an equal vote and rights?

It’s a deviant grotesque charade that’s fundamentally racist and segregated, as it violates international law and commits war crimes with flagrant, arrogant impunity.

Defund Israel NOW!

Such obscene racist murder and destruction cannot be carried out in the name of the United States and/or “democracy” any longer. Demand a ceasefire immediately, force (by any/all means necessary) Israel to forfeit it’s illegal nuclear arsenal (just like Apartheid South Africa), and let Israel disintegrate into the dustbin of history as the abject failure and moral aberration it is.

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu 2023

It’s the second day of summer, but while (re)organizing some old paperwork in my study today, I came across something that drew me immediately back to a winter day 25 years ago. The real “Big Wednesday,” January 28, 1998, probably the largest surf I have seen (then or now); and probably the most giant day since the massive swell of 1969. This was the biggest, cleanest, most perfect day of surf I have (or anyone else has) ever seen. The North Shore was 40’ plus (80’ – 100’ faces!) and totally closed out, breaking miles out to sea. Waimea Bay looked like a frothing toilet bowl, washing through from Outside Alligators.

The entire surfing world was at The Bay in preparation for the Eddie Aikau big wave contest — all the pros and invitees and their entourages, as well as thousands of spectators and the Elite (Keaulaunas, DeSotos, Napoleans, Pu’us, et al.) of the Westside (Makaha) contingent included. Everyone was at Waimea Bay and it was obvious (at least to me) that the contest wasn’t going to run — it was too big!

My buddies Blake Reynolds (“The Goleta Goofyfoot”), Edis Begovic,1 Bruce Lenarud, and the notorious Eric Haas split immediately in search of somewhere to surf . . . we ended up at the Kepuhi, the fabled corner of Northwest of Oahu otherwise known as Point Surf Makaha (but that’s another story) . . .2

A couple days later, the cover of the Honolulu Advertiser read: “Surfer Demands Freedom to Take Risks.” I’m quite sure that hadn’t been published before (or for that matter since). The intrepid surfer in question was Greg Russ, one of my friends (a mentor really) and surfing partners, who died a couple years ago down in Pascuales, Mainland Mexico.3 The photo shows him arguing with a lifeguard, whom we’ll call “Curlycue,” at least that’s what I heard some of the guys that worked with him call him (behind his back). Greg and Jungle (an infamous Hawaiian-Filipino underground big-wave rider) were barred that day from attempting to surf giant, mostly closed out Waimea Bay — which, by the afternoon, had “dropped” to a more manageable 25’ - 30’.

The article quotes Russ in relevant part:

I’ve surfed Waimea almost every time it’s broke since 1982. It was 20 to 30 feet and the best I’ve ever seen it! I was studying it like a mathematician; I wasn’t going out to commit suicide. They kept me from what could have been the best surfing of my life - and a chance to win $50,000!

By contrast, Chief lifeguard Jim Howe was quoted as saying:

There’s no question it was risk of imminent death for anyone who went in the water. It would have been morally wrong not to try and prevent people.

While Greg argued with Curlycue and them, Jason Majors slipped into the water off the rocks only to get washed in by a 35’ set. Miraculously he survived. In the words of Owl Chapman:

Jason was sitting 50 yards too deep on the Point and 50 yards too far inside. I thought for sure that he was a Goner a couple of times.

Equally miraculous, neither Jason’s board nor cord (surf leash) broke; and although he failed to actually catch or ride a wave, he made it back to the sand on his own — only to be promptly arrested and taken into custody by Honolulu’s finest (allegedly for “trespassing” and a series of outstanding bench warrants) and shuttled to Cellblock downtown on Beretania Street (I’ve spent a night or two there myself in the cold, cemented bowels beneath HPD Headquarters).

Greg had the last word:

I don’t count on Waimea lifeguards. None of the guys on duty are competent Waimea surfers. They’re not able to deal with big waves as safely as me and my friends. They have their lifeguard shirt on and they did their thing, but that doesn’t cut it in my league. They haven’t paid their dues out there.

Postscript:

The Waimea lifeguards took offense to Greg’s derisive candor. So did the Quicksilver “In Memory of Eddie Aikau” contest director George Downing, a legend in his own right, although a little prickly when it came to “Haole” criticism. The next morning, the day after “Big Wednesday,” dawned wet and rainy and the surf had dropped considerably. Crowds gathered once again at the Bay; but the surf was rather undramatic and slow, less than half the size of the previous day. It was obvious that it wasn’t a day for the big-wave contest; and Downing made the inevitable call to postpone, like he had countless times before in the previous decade.

As Downing held court at the Waimea lifeguard tower — standing regally like a Pope — the lifeguards gathered together and conspired a plan to revenge themselves on Russ, who stood nonchalant to the Sunset/river side of the beach park, alone. Greg didn’t expect what happened next. A few lifeguards (who shall remain nameless for now out of deference to the fact that some of these guys are still working today) moved slyly toward Russ, coming in from behind. The first (a big-muscle steroid guy who was known as more of a boogie boarder than a surfer and was an aspiring Jiu Jitsu “fighter”) lunged at and grabbed Greg’s back, trying to get an arm-lock on his neck.

Greg spun and writhed away in a flash, swung a lightning-fast right hook, and connected with the sneaky aggressor’s left jaw. He went down immediately. Two other lifeguards pounced on Russ and tried to overpower him to no avail. Once more, Greg wiggled loose (the Hawaiian martial art “Lua” has a word for such an evasive move: o’opuola — “like a thrashing eel”), and held his ground — calling the “kooks” out for what they were: “Come! I’ll kick all your asses!” He wasn’t afraid — he was “ready for go!”

Greg breathed power!

As this incident played out, a photographer standing near Downing raised his camera to get a shot of the violent spectacle. Downing pushed the photographer (from behind) with the intention of preventing the photographer from getting a photo (which, of course, would have been damning evidence of the underhanded — and illegal — tactics of the lifeguards dog-pile). Someone grabbed the photographer’s camera. George Downing was in on it and it’s safe to assume he had given the guards his blessing to “mob” Greg.

A standoff ensued. The lifeguards had failed to overtake Greg. Russ was defiant, if not also ready to rumble. The cowardly lifeguards backed off and slinked toward the tower. Somebody next to Downing yelled: “Go back to the Mainland, Haole!” Greg laughed and walked slowly to his car.

Downing was later arrested and charged with something like terroristic threatening of the photographer (who had filed a report with HPD). I’m not sure what happened with all of that later on — probably not much. Yet the point was made clearly enough for anyone (such as myself) present that drizzling, damp morning and otherwise aware of what went down the day before.

Greg Russ was and remains a legend. A courageous iconoclast. And it’s simply too bad he (and Jungle) didn't get a chance to test and prove themselves that afternoon. So it goes . . .

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu 2023

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Both myth and science are expressions of the world — characteristic of the human drive to self-expression. Each involve or presuppose intuition and creativity. But self-expression demands a presence, for which it occurs.

This presence is the environing world of being and becoming as to the nature of things (de rerum natura). Thus does the thinking, creative, intuitive creature express itself in and for its world. In expressing itself it becomes at once self-aware and happily aware of the world — it makes a statement that makes sense of and joyfully lays claim to and otherwise affirms the world as it is — as it worlds.

Nothing human, no aspect of the environing world is excluded from either mythology or science.

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Dane Kealoha was a giant, one of the truly great Hawaiian surfers of his (any) generation, respected, revered, sometimes feared, and loved by all who knew — or knew of — him. The King of Backdoor for a decade or more in the 1980s. He should have been World Champ a couple times (1982/83) but was robbed by a stupid, corrupt Haole system rigged for Aussies.1 Whatever. Everyone knew who was best.

Dane took tuberiding to another level in waves of consequence, forging a path of daring, graceful, deep, high-performance power surfing like no one else before and everyone since stands on his shoulders in such respect. Generations of power surfers and tube riders — starting with Hawaiian greats such as Johnny-Boy Gomes and Sunny Garcia, as well as others such as World Champion South Africans Shaun Thompson and Martin Potter, and a long list up to and including John-John Florence today — bear his mark and owe Dane an eternal debt of gratitude.

Images of Dane charging giant Honolua Bay or Point Surf Makaha are among the most awesome surf photos I’ve seen. I didn’t know Dane, but I surfed with him plenty, always kept my distance and exercised discretion — everyone did in his presence. The thing about surfing with Dane was that if he showed up, one could be more or less certain about a few things. Number One: that spot was probably the best surf on Oahu at that moment of the day. Number Two: Dane was going to sit outside and wait for the best waves — he “was solitary and strangely quiet [as he waited for sets] almost anchored, not bobbing around like the rest of us at the mercy of the temperamental Hawaiian waters, but somehow rooted to the spot” observed Tim Baker. Number Three: Dane was going to catch and masterfully ride the best, biggest sets. Nobody challenged him. Ever. Dane was a Hawaiian Force of Nature. Pure Mana.

I have a funny little story in such regard. About 30 odd years ago (early 1990s), I was out at Sunset Point on small, but good day, maybe 2’-4’ (Hawaiian = head high). Just a few of us out, spread between the Boneyard and the inside West Bowl. It was gorgeous. Then one heard: “All you Haoles, BEAT IT!” This was a Dane — not the Dane (Kealoha) — but one of his squires, the formidable and very intimidating Perry Dane, who resided at the time on Huelo Street, which is the street Sunset Point is situated. This was back when the “Black Shorts” (i.e., Hui — as in. Hui O He’e Nalu) still meant something very serious, such as the prospect (indeed probability) of immediate, impeding violence (physical and/or psychological) was upon anyone/everyone in the vicinity. Dane and Perry had their Black shorts on, to be sure. They were accompanied by Alika Moepono and a couple other braddahs. Perry was clearing the water — declaring the sacred waters of Paumalu KAPU.

I immediately put my head down and paddled inside toward Vals — the opposite direction of this Hawaiian posse, making sure to keep my eyes downcast so as not to violate the Kapu. I got to the beach, scurried up into the shaded bushes, and watched. It was a clinic in High Performance Hawaiian Hot Dogging. Better than any surf movie. These guys were ripping: left-go-right fades to deep bottom turns; tube rides; figure-eight full roundhouse cutbacks; hitting the lip and sending sheets of water 10’-12’ above the lip line . . . so fast, so precise, so powerful. It was beautiful. One learned from these guys. Respect. Deference. Discretion . . . and How For Surf properly. Like a Hawaiian.

Several months later that winter, I was out again on a bigger day, this time on the Inside Bowl. North Swell, 6’-8’ and barreling. It was epic. Not many out either, spread across the grand expanse of the First Reef, from the Point to the Bowl. Once again, I heard the warning: “Beat it, HAOLES!” Ok, session over. It was the Danes — Perry (sounding the bugle, as it were) and Kealoha, silent and stoic. I started to paddle in, keeping myself as small and inconspicuous as I could. Then I heard something, shall we say, unexpected. “No, brah, you can stay. Just stay out of the way!” Perry actually let me stay and surf with them. Dane might have even glanced at me with something that felt like tolerance. I couldn’t believe it. It was a major Rite of Passage for me and to this day one of my fondest, proudest memories. Mahalo Nui, guys. This time I got to learn up close in the water, in the proverbial classroom with the Ali’i. I’ll never forget it.

My friend Eric Haas (with whom I spoke yesterday) knew Dane. Knew him, his brothers, and his family well. Eric said Dane was “the best, along with Buttons, real nice but could get a little rugged.” Eric didn’t elaborate. Last time he saw Dane at Point Panic in Town not too long ago, Dane said he was headed back to Maui . . .

Mistaken, premature rumors of Dane’s passing started floating across the Coconut Wireless a few days ago and were swiftly silenced as family and friends gathered around Dane in a Honolulu hospital. Dane gracefully transitioned yesterday afternoon to the next realm. He was 64. Dane will always be admired, honored, and missed.

Aloha Nō, Dane.

Wind's gonna blow, so I'm gonna go

Down on the road again

Starting where the mountains left me

I'm up where I began

Where I will go, the wind only knows

Good times around the bend

Get in my car, goin' too far

Never comin' back again

Tired and worn, I woke up this mornin'

Found that I was confused

Spun right around and found I had lost

The things that I couldn't lose

The beaches they sell to build their hotels

My father's and I once knew

Birds all along sunlight at dawn

Singing Waimanalo blues

Down on the road with mountains so old

Far on the country side

Birds on the wing forget in a while

So I'm headed for the windward side

All of your dreams, sometimes it just seems

That I'm just along for the ride

Some they will cry because they have pride

For someone who's loved here died

The beaches they sell to build their hotels

My father's and I once knew

Birds all along sunlight at dawn

Singing Waimanalo blues

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This might be one of my favorite surf photos because it marks my first real big wave experience. I was alone, except for my girlfriend, Tasch, who took this photograph. We were on Nantucket that summer (1986) living at the end of the road in Madaket, close to the public access to the beach. It was the (or an) end of the island.

Madaket is not usually the best surf spot on Nantucket; but this day was extraordinary in that there was a hurricane (Charley) coming, the groundswell pushed before it was giant (by East Coast standards); and the conditions were clean, absolutely perfect.1 The swell wrapped around the island in long, ruler-edged lines, peeling lefts with a beautiful curl, throwing out almost top-to-bottom. I hadn’t seen, much less surfed anything like it before.

It was easily double overhead, with bigger sets. Now, I would call it 6’ plus (close to 8’). At the time, I was calling it “20 feet!” with a straight face — the faces were easy 15’-20’. What did I know? Not much . . . It was pumping! And I was stoked. A little scared, but mostly amped.

Although the shore-break was dumping hard, with a wide open channel, the paddle out access was easy. Catching one of these behemoths and making the drop, however, was another matter altogether, especially on my 5’10” quad,2 which was hardly the right board.3 I managed to scratch into a couple shoulders, pretty close to the peak, make some semi airdrops, and draw a bottom turn out onto the flats, maintaining trim. It was awesome. Evolution! I’d never gone so fast on a surfboard or felt so exhilarated. Little did I know, but I was on a path that would lead me places I couldn’t (at the time) begin to imagine.

I caught several waves and eventually got washed to the beach. Totally exhausted and completely stoked. As I was walking up the sand, I saw an old WWII-era Army Jeep coming my way with two guys in wetsuits and a couple big boards (sleek guns) in the back. They were locals, older than me, clearly surprised to find kook kid coming in from a solo session. They stopped and asked me my name and where I was from. I said: “Andy, from Dedham.” They looked, shall we say, incredulous. One of them was a fellow named Chris Emery, if I remember correctly; he owned the surf shop (Indian Summer) in town. Anyway, those guys couldn’t get out there fast enough.

The weather turned sour quick and bad in the ensuing moments — the sky went dark purple and the winds increased violently. Tasch and I hid under the bed, holding one another tight, as the wind whipped and whirled around the little, single-story, clapboard cottage we were staying in (it felt/sounded like the beginning of The Wizard of Oz when the tornado strikes) until everything suddenly went calm. The eye of the hurricane passed over at that moment.

True religion.

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu

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A kind, gentle, creative soul moved on to the next plane and left behind all those who admired and loved him for the Pure Aloha he embodied, exemplified, and shared with everyone he met. The world was lucky to have had him.

Peter Trombly’s music was singular and absolutely gorgeous, often mesmerizing in its sonic wafting beauty — for me it was the Sound of Huelo Street and would accompany me as I strolled by his house (the antipode of mine on Huelo) and enter the sacred waters of Paumalu for a surf. He’d hit a note or some interesting, harmonic chord as a way of saying “Hi” just as I passed his house, Peter casually sitting there cast in the shade by the window. Sunset Point Music par excellence. Surf sounds . . . Listen to the tunes embedded and attached (above & below) hereto . . . let your soul soar with his . . .

An all around artist, Peter’s knowledge and expertise as a surfer and shaper went deep, back to the roots of Hawaiian Soul Surfing and, especially, windsurfing — he was at the vanguard of it all at Backyards (one of the original “Yardbirds”) and Diamond Head in the late 1970s and early ‘80s through the 1990s when I met him. He was also an excellent glasser. Peter helped me with one of my favorite guns (The Panther — an 11’7” triple stringer single fin pintail Owl Chapman shaped for me in 1997) that I lost at Point Surf Makaha about 15 or so years ago, which had washed on the rocks.1 The pintail had been crushed; I was bummed. Peter simply sawed it off (I was horrified at first!) and made this elegant wooden tailblock, perfectly fashioned, and glassed it on just so. I was stoked! It looked better than before; that tailblock has driven off the bottom of some big blue waves many times since . . . I was and remain honored to be in the rarefied community of those who benefitted from his expertise.

Simply put, Peter was A Master Craftsman. He shaped and glassed boards for Eddie Aikau among many others, under the esoteric label: “Peter Built.” Another legendary shaper for countless legends, Pat Rawson (musician/surfer/shaper who jammed with Peter for over 45 years), declared that “Peter glassed my boards for a long while; and his glass jobs were beautiful, the strongest in the business.” Highest praise from on high.

To say that I’ll miss seeing and speaking with Peter — a daily occurrence for the past 25 years, whether it be at the beach (after his swim), on the bike path (on his morning walk), or on our street as he raked the yard or collected the bins (both his and his neighbors) — is an understatement. Always gracious and generous with a smile. Yet, I know that his spirit will endure. He won’t be far. Just listen to the tape . . . (Miles Davis said that).

I truly love his music. So much so that I encouraged Peter to record some of those inspired magical afternoon improvisation jam sessions. Thank God he did — and Mahalo Nui Loa he shared a couple discs with me, which I have and will always treasure. Back in 2005, I actually told him that one day we’ll just “listen to the tape” with gratitude and joy once he’s gone. He laughed and a few days later said: “Hey, Andy, I got something for you!” Well, that day came too soon, totally unexpectedly, I’m stunned; Peter died mowing the lawn a couple days ago . . . so it goes. There are worse ways to go.

Now all we can do is listen to the tape of Peter’s light profound genius floating and flying in the ethereal spheres of Wao Akua and reflect gratefully on a life creatively actualized and well lived. Aloha ‘Oe, my friend.

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu

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Eternal Return

The Panther — El Niño 1997-98

Craig “Owl” Chapman has probably ridden more set waves at Waimea Bay than anyone in history. Here’s Owl and I at the Bay during the epic El Niño winter season 1997-98. That season was truly historic and marks the highwater mark (pun intended) for my generation, the biggest, best, most consistent winter of surf since the storied…

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4 years ago · 9 likes · Andy St. Onge

In “On The Road,” Jack Kerouac wrote:

The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes “Awww!”

I have always loved this excerpt and was reminded of it again when reflecting on Larry Haynes, who died on February 9, 2023. He epitomized the extraordinary spirit Kerouac champions to an absolute “T.” For what it’s worth, Larry moved on to the next realm (“The Great Mystery”) doing what he loved, having just come in from a surf at Laniakea, which, to my mind, is worth a lot.

Larry Haynes was one of those few authentic individuals that can be described as “larger than life,” as well as fearless. He was both. Larry was also a creative visionary who not only imagined what was possible but actualized his vision in ways that basically revolutionized water cinematography. He was at the vanguard of what could be accomplished with a camera in heavy water big waves like no one else. His act will be a hard one to follow.

Larry embodied an overflowing, generous heart and gave everything he had to so many, including myself. He’d just send me clips & photos out of the blue, never asked for or expected anything (except perhaps a team ride together at the Point — we rode hundreds if not thousands of waves together over the past 30 plus years). His pidgin was pretty good too; always cracking jokes and making fun (of me mostly). Bottom line is that Larry loved and excelled at what he did and we all loved him for his exuberance and expertise.

A devoted father and family man, he’d spend hours in the water shooting his daughter Lily and her friends longboard at the Point, just as stoked as he was filming the best surfers in the world at Pipe or giant Waimea and Jaws.

Not just a photographer with a keen eye behind the lens, Larry was, first and last, a full-on soul surfer. He loved surfing as much as anyone ever; and he was good, not to mention extremely competitive! I am grateful to have known Larry and to have had the opportunity to spend so much time with him in the water, mostly at Sunset, a sacred place we both devoted much of our lives to and deeply love.

My heart and condolences go out to his family at this time. To be sure, Larry’s sudden, unexpected passing is a tragedy for his family. No doubt they are devastated and my heart aches for them.

However, I also recognize that Larry lived life – his life – to its absolute fullest. No question there either. Larry was an exemplar of Pure Stoke. He was full throttle from the start to the end, all day, every day, each and every swell: big waves, small waves, no waves. Whatever, whenever, whoever . . . Ready For Go! Can’t say that about too many people.

Larry was the real deal. Boundless energy, endless enthusiasm, positivity, total commitment. He will be missed. Like a shooting star or comet that streams across and lights up the night sky . . . Kerouac’s “mad” genius incarnate.

For years and until rather recently (literally a couple weeks ago), I prodded Larry to make the true North Shore Surf Movie. He had almost 4 decades of deep underground and pro footage, ranging from the early 1990s until the most recent “Backdoor Shootout,” “Eddie Aikau Big Wave Invitational” and “Pipe Pro.” It’s mind boggling to consider what could be done with all that material of everyone from Junior (Moepono), Dane (Kealoha), Marvin (Foster), Ronnie (Burns) – you name them – to Mason (Ho), Seth (Moniz), Barron (Mamiya), Luke (Shepardson), et al., and everyone and everything in between. Groms to grandads; the good, bad, & ugly.

Larry was there to document it all from the inside (literally parked in the pit) and behind the scenes, on land and in the water. It would be amazing to behold his complete ouvre in all its depth, complexity, nuance, and glory.1 Indeed, it would be truly Epic.

Larry would just laugh when I got all excited about the historical treasures he had in his back pocket and hard drive(s). But he was too in the present to worry about (or get hung up on) the past. I admired his complete lack of sentimentality in such regard. Zero nostalgia. He simply didn’t have time for it. Larry was 100% NOW! Now and forever. Still yet, I really wish somebody would make that movie through the eyes of Larry Haynes . . . Hana Hou!

A paddle out memorial celebration of Larry’s life will be held at Paumalu (Sunset Beach) on Sunday, February 26, 2023 at 11 a.m.

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu

This song reminds me of Larry. We both loved the Beach Boys and Dennis Wilson was the only Beach Boy who actually surfed. Aloha ‘Oe, Larry!

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The most beautiful surfboard I have ever seen was shaped by Pat Curren. It was in Jack Reeves old shop tucked behind a snarl of Keawe bush at Don Bachman’s place across the street from Rockies Mauka side of Kam Highway. Along with Curren’s longtime surfing and shaping partner Mike Diffenderfer, Jack was restoring this elegant balsa broadsword for Ricardo Pomar, who had recently acquired this treasure through some sort of clandestine negotiation.

Before finding its way to Jack’s shop, the Curren gun had been hanging behind a dingy bar in Town, a place called “Mateos” near Waikiki, just off Kalakaua Avenue. It belonged to the barkeep, a local Hawaiian named Freddy Noa. Reportedly, Noa had been a decent surfer back in the day (1950s) as well as an associate of Pat Curren.Noa somehow ended up with this masterpiece in the 1960s. Thereabouts 1988-89 or so, he was looking to sell the board to the highest bidder. The notorious Flippy Hoffman (also a friend and contemporary of Curren) bid $2000, but he never paid up. That’s when Ricardo stepped in and offered $2500 in cash, which, at the time, Noa was happy to take. After having Jack and Diff restore the board to original, pristine condition and admiring it in his possession for the next 30 years or so, Pomar eventually sold “Stradivarius” (as it was called) for almost ten times what he paid for it — much to Noa’s chagrin, who had tried to buy it back from Ricardo more than once. So it goes.

At the time, probably 1990 or so, I was living at V-Land on Kaunala Street in a house full of heavy big-wave riders with their Brewer and Owl pintails hanging in the rafters, otherwise strewn around the house or in the living room standing against the walls, and out in the garage. I had a few Owls myself at this point and was well-accustomed to the omnipresence and gravitas of the “finest, hand-crafted precision surfboards in the world” (quoting the Brewer-Chapman “Top Gun” logo). At the tender age of 21, I had already become a surfboard connoisseur.

Some years later, in 2002, I had the opportunity to meet Pat Curren. It was late Spring, probably April, and I was out alone surfing Sunset Point, just down the street (Huelo) from where I live. The waves were small and clean, a little West swell refracted perfectly off the Boneyard into crisp, bowling runners across the reef. I love days like that. I was riding one of my three-stringer 11’ single-fin pintail semi-guns shaped by Owl (a modern interpretation of the original “Pipeliners” designed and shaped by Brewer in the mid-‘60s for guys like Pat’s Windansea bud Butch Van Artsdalen). Cruise control in full forward trim. As I sat there by myself waiting for another set, I spotted someone walking down the path at the public beach access to what is called “Mother’s Beach.”

In some way, I knew immediately — instinctively I suppose — that the figure I observed slowly making his way to the shoreline, a longboard under his arm, almost a hundred yards away, was Pat Curren. No lie. I knew it was him. I was stunned, almost took my breath away. I’d actually seen him a few years before (1999) when he was on the North Shore for a minute. At that time, he was at the Bay watching his son, the three-time world champion Tom Curren, ride a beautiful morning of 15’-20’ waves on a replica gun he had shaped for his son Tom.1 Tom and I spoke in the water that day and I checked out his board (it was beautiful). Tom was charging, of course, surfing it well. When I came in and walked by the Lifeguard tower on my way to the showers, I saw Pat Curren standing there alone. I didn’t say anything. I was in awe.

So, I guess I must have intuitively recognized him from the initial passing encounter. That day in 2002, he looked old, though, and tired; older than the 70 years I suppose he was (doing the math in my head), as well as a little awkward, kind of off balance, as one who hasn’t paddled a board in a while often appears. I just sat there and observed, although I didn’t look too closely out of respect and deference. Still, it was just him and me out there. I was stoked! Curren paddled right up next to me. Didn’t say a word. Neither did I. A set approached. He laid down and began to paddle for the wave.

Curren caught the wave. But, as I remember, he didn’t (couldn’t?) stand up. He just sort-of belly rode the wave until it faded out on the inside in the channel. I thought to myself: “There but by the grace of God and time go I” – goes all of us if we make it that far in life. Even and especially the best grow old, weary, and lose it, sooner or later. I recalled Ricky Grigg telling me a how he regretted losing his timing and balance, the ability to leap to his feet (in his 60s). Peter Cole often recited the adage: “We start off as kooks and we end up kooks.” To be sure, however Pat Curren is no kook.

I caught the next wave, trimmed across the bowl, and kicked out, gliding next to him. We paddled back out together, me just a little behind him, again out of respect for a man I revered as a demigod. No words. Not yet. Once we returned to the lineup zone, we both sat up on our boards and Curren said casually: “Nice board you got there.” I smiled and said “thank you.” He asked who shaped it and I told him that Owl Chapman did. He smiled and said: “I thought it was a Brewer,” adding graciously that “My name’s Pat.”

We talked story for a bit. He told me he had been in Mexico and was in town to say goodbye to Mike Diffenderfer, his old friend from Windasea and early North Shore days. Of course, I thought, knowing that Diff was terminally ill (with brain cancer) and in hospice down the road in Waialee at the Crawford’s Convalescent Home. A melancholy moment, signaling the end of an era . . . We traded off a few more mini-waves, Pat belly-riding and seeming to enjoy himself. Then he went in and disappeared up the path. Gone as quickly and quietly as he had appeared. I never saw him again.

“Part of his pure quality,” Ricky Grigg recalled around this time (2000s), “was his inability to compromise with society, which was why he came to Hawaii in the first place. The fact that he’s [living down] in Mexico, in that setting, is completely consistent with that attitude.” Fred Van Dyke offered this insight:

I’m not sure anyone really knew Pat, I don’t think anyone ever penetrated his depth. And that was sort of his charm. He was quiet, strong and silent, sort of a John Wayne type. . . . The image I’ll always have is from Waimea one day in 25-foot surf. We’re all standing around, waxing our boards, and there’s Pat with a cigarette and a beer. He walks down to the shore, flips the beer over his head, kicks the cigarette into the ocean, paddles out and catches the wave of the day.

That exquisite Curren javelin I saw in Jack’s shop back in 1990 (see photo above) was something to behold. Otherwise known as “Stradivarius” — an allusion to the rarefied violins prized for the highest quality construction and finest sound — the board was shaped sometime in the late ‘50s (’58? ’59?) from a beige balsa blank, ten feet six inches (10’6”) in length, composed of seven (7) redwood stringers; a narrow tail pulled tight into a baby squash; super hard rails; a little roll in the belly near the nose flowed into a flat panel that ran into a relatively small fin that looked more like a rudder or keel (in stark contrast to the more modern broad-based, raked gun fin later developed and refined by Brewer, Jack, and Owl to which I’d become accustomed). At once exotic and erotic, this was an extremely sexy surfboard.

Indeed, this spear-like gun was an exceptional work of art, like a sculpture by Michelangelo. It wasn’t no wall-hanger judging by the dings and water damage. It was the original “Rhino Chaser,” an “Elephant Gun” (both terms coined by Curren’s loquacious peer, Buzzy Trent), a “Stradivarius” shaped and designed to catch and ride the best, largest, most challenging waves in the world at Waimea Bay.2 Moreover, this was, in fact, the first board to successfully ride the biggest, baddest waves in surfing.

Jack Reeve’s shop was and remains comparable to the Louvre, the Smithsonian, and the Museum of Modern Art all in one – or, alternatively, the workshop studio of Leonardo Da Vinci – when it comes to flawless surfboards. Ground Zero. The epicenter. Where it all comes together into the final, finished product. Only the finest specimens of the state of the art of shaping and glassing – Non Plus Ultra, or, as the Hawaiians say: No Ka Oi. Predominantly Brewers and Owls, balsa and foam masterworks (mostly Sunset and Waimea boards), including a few Diffenderfer wooden masterpieces, as well as a variety of finely tuned foils shaped by Pat Rawson and Chuck Andrus designed for the Pipeline Underground. In this enchanted milieu, the board shaped by Pat Curren was outstanding. Owl pointed to it and said to me: “That’s where it all began.” The prototype for the modern big wave gun.

Brewer said as much, too. Reflecting on his evolution into the greatest shaper of all time, RB gave unambiguous credit to Curren as being one of the “the greatest” influences on his shaping philosophy and practice back in the early 1960s, along with other notable innovators such as Joe Quigg, Bob Sheppard, and Diffenderfer, all of whom were in their prime as Richard “Dick” Brewer came into his own under the label Surfboards Hawaii, which he founded in Haleiwa in 1961. Largely based on what he observed and learned from the Maestro Curren, Brewer completely revolutionized the design and shape of the modern big-wave gun. In such regard, Brewer credited that “Curren was into hard rails and flat bottoms. Pat put as much flat bottom as he could into a board. [In 1960] he was in in his prime . . . Curren was the greatest. I took off from where he left off.”

I was enthralled as I ran my hand across the flat bottom, along the rail, felt the turn of the rail in the middle blend into a razor-sharp edge near the narrow squash tail. Not only did it look like it could catch and ride a giant wave, this board actually did catch and ride the biggest waves (then as now: 25’ plus) at Waimea Bay in the late 1950s and early 1960s, surfed masterfully by the man who shaped it: Patrick King Curren.

Peter Cole, one of the “Coast Haole” pioneers that first migrated to the North Shore and charged Sunset and Waimea along with Curren, stated plainly: “Pat was the master, the King of Waimea. To this day, I’ve never seen anybody get bigger, cleaner waves or ride them so well.”3 Anna Trent (Buzzy’s daughter) corroborates Cole’s testimony: “Then, even by the standards of now, [Curren] surfed the Bay impeccably well. Some say the best.” Top Gun. Non Plus Ultra.

Highest praise. The “King” indeed. This isn’t nostalgic bluster or hyperbole. I’ve directly observed and surfed with the best big wave riders for the past four decades at The Bay and I can attest with confidence that the waves I’ve seen Curren ride in the old surf films alone (not to mention what I’ve been told by reliable authorities like Peter Cole, Ricky Grigg, and others who surfed with him) including all the photos and testimonials from other first-hand witnesses (etc.), Pat Curren rode as well (and big) as ANYBODY then or now — including this most recent Eddie Invitational (January 22, 2023) which was held in absolutely maxing 25’ plus epic Waimea with the best surfers: Luke Shepardson, Billy Kemper, Mark Healey, John Florence, Kai Lenny, and the rest.

What a name, too: Pat “King” Curren — one he lived up to. He was one of a kind. Singular. Born in 1932 in Carlsbad and raised in and around Mission Beach with two brothers, Curren described himself as “growing up bodysurfing and belly boarding in Mission Beach.” When it came to board riding, he started in 1950, 18 years-old at Windansea, the archetypal La Jolla surf spot, known for its strong surf and idiosyncratic locals. “Nobody taught me to surf. Does anybody teach anybody? It’s kind of like learning how to ride a bike. Somebody gives you a push, then watches you crash into a pole.”

The laconic Curren was conditioned by a feral environment near the Mexican border in the raw, open-ocean waves of Windansea and the wild, lawless environs surrounding Tijuana. In the post-war era, there was an uninhibited subculture of non-conformist Epicureans of a certain athletic (if also alcoholic) bent, those who lived close to nature, spontaneously, by their wits and handiwork, even artistry, rejecting the strictures of the Eisenhower Era; while the rest of an American herd dutifully complied with the homogenizing, self-limited prospects of the 1950s. Surfers in general, and Curren in particular, were Aquatic Bohemians, energetic, hedonistic rebels that aspired to a form of Eudaimonia (human flourishing) not seen or experienced since the Ancient Hawaiians. Along with other luminaries from the La Jolla Windansea crew (e.g., Mike Diffenderfer, Butch Van Arstdalen, Al Nelson, Wayne Land, Dave Cheney, Buzzy Bent, et al.), Curren was a unique exemplar of this dare-devil, seemingly reckless, rebellious spirit.

Soon after he started surfing, he began to build surfboards, first for himself and then for others who admired his exacting craftsmanship. “I worked with Al Nelson and Dave Cheney, building boards for people we knew,” Curren recalled. “This was before stickers. We used a rubber stamp, ‘Nelson Surfboards.’ The guys that put no money down on their boards got theirs first. If they paid in advance they had to wait. That was pretty standard in the industry.” They were shaping balsa boards in the beginning (before the advent of polyurethane foam blanks were available) in vacant lots, the Windansea parking lot, random garages, and on the beach under the pier. Curren, Nelson, and Cheney tried opening a legit shaping “shop,” but that didn’t last very long.   

The lure of The Islands was irresistible once photos of the big surf at Makaha were published in the Mainland press in 1953.4 Soon thereafter, the Windansea crew were winging (and sailing) their way to Oahu in search of The Big Blue Wave. The rudimentary, subsistence lifestyle they devised in and around Windansea transposed fluidly to the rural North Shore, which, at the time, was deep Country, composed of a rotting old railroad track that circled the island; some muddy, bumpy dirt roads; a couple overgrown pineapple fields and a cattle ranch at Kaunala (now V-Land); as well as several small subsistence pig and chicken farms run by Chinese and Hawaiian locals in and around Paumalu (Sunset Beach) Northeast of sleepy Haleiwa town.

“Even though occasional surfers had been driving out,” Flippy Hoffman remembers, “no one was actually living there” on the North Shore at the time.

There were very few people . . . pig ranchers and shit. Not many Hawaiians either. And they didn’t even look at surfers. It’s like it is today [in] Kahuku — you don’t even know they’re there. And there sure weren’t any haoles. Nothing.

Humble, hungry, and single-minded, Curren was at the vanguard, living a simple hand-to-mouth lifestyle centered around the ocean. He first set up a rudimentary camp on a vacant lot next to the beach at Pupukea, near what would be known as the Banzai Pipeline (named by his Windansea comrade Mike Diffenderfer). Curren was an avid diver and caught most of his food with a spear (Hawaiian sling) or his bare hands (wrestling Honu — sea turtles — to the surface from deep free-dives); otherwise he poached random feral fowl in the bush. Greg Noll confessed:

When Pat and I went on patrol, there wasn’t a chicken or a duck that was safe. I can still see us running down the beach at Pupukea with a big fat chicken in each hand, calves burning in the soft sand with a couple of pit bulls on our ass. We’d barbeque ‘em up later and have a hell of a dinner. Pat was also a pretty decent fisherman and a great diver. So between the ocean, the chickens and the ducks, he got along pretty good.

This set the standard pace for the underground avant-garde North Shore regimen that persisted for decades. Noll declared that Curren “molded it into a state-of-the art lifestyle.”

Not long after the improvised beach camp, Pat and some of the Windansea guys rented a dilapidated Quonset Hut on Sunset Point (in what would come to be known as the “Backyards” neighborhood) for $60 a month, living (and arguing) together in a Spartan commune of sorts. Curren et al. gutted the Quonset hut, knocking out the walls and transforming the structure into an open gallery with surfboard racks floor-to-ceiling on the walls on either side, bunks beneath, and a long slab of a table down the middle. They called it the “Meade Hall” in honor of their (imagined) Viking forbears. Curren proudly presided at the head of the table sporting a Viking helmut with a ryhyton (Scandanavian drinking horn) overflowing with meade (more probably beer) in hand – Skål!

Between 1955 and 1957 the primary focus was on the glorious, challenging, shifting peaks of Paumalu (Sunset Beach) and the elusive Bluebirds at Point Surf Makaha on Oahu’s Westside during the Autumn and Winter months; as well as the smooth, powder blue cloud-breaks off Waikiki in Town (Honolulu) during the summer. This period was when Pat got serious about building surfboards, taking what he had learned back on the Coast (with Nelson, Cheney, Diff, and a colorful character from Hermosa Beach named Dale Velzy — namesake of Velzyland5) to another level of expertise. Curren’s designs and shaping methods evolved quickly as he adapted to the powerful waves of Oahu. Others soon took notice.

“I really started shaping boards [on my own] in 1956-57,” Pat recalled. “I was walking down the beach at Waikiki and a guy at a rental board place asked me who had made the board I was carrying. I said I did. He asked me to make 20 rental boards. So I rented a shop in Haleiwa and got into it.” Mike Doyle, a contemporary and champion surfer, recounts:

What really set Curren apart, and won him the admiration of the others, was that he made the most beautiful, streamlined surfboards any of us had ever seen. Each one of his boards was a cross between a work of art and a weapon, like some beautifully crafted spear. Curren had learned how to attach slabs of wood to the nose and tail of a board to get more rocker, or curve. And his boards went like rockets. In those days, speed was everything. Riding big waves wasn’t about style or looking pretty or making graceful cutbacks or any of that. It was about going for the biggest wave and hoping you didn’t get killed. Curren’s boards were designed to go straight down the line, hard and fast. They gave you a chance at survival.

Necessity is the mother of invention; and North Shore big-wave riders needed, among other things, more rocker (curve) in their surfboards to accommodate the steep, barreling waves of Sunset Beach, Laniakea, and Haleiwa, as well as the long, precipitous, hollow walls of Makaha — and, soon enough, the beckoning giant combers of Waimea Bay. Pat was probably the first to put rocker in his boards in the late ‘50s. This innovation was, according to Doyle, “his real genius.” Additionally, he developed templates out of Masonite so that he could refine and replicate both his outlines and rocker into prototypes of certain gun designs. Doyle remarked that “Curren developed that template through years of big-wave riding, countless wipeouts, who knows how many scars and bruises, endless hours at a drafting table, plus an enormous amount of natural talent.” These developments, tweaks, and improvements in shapes and designs instigated a paradigm shift in the evolution of modern big-wave-riding equipment.

1957 marks yet another huge leap forward into the relatively unknown — and unridden — realm. Up until that point, Waimea Bay remained strictly Kapu: sacred, forbidden, and foreboding. The conventional wisdom, even among these pioneer Devil-may-care iconoclasts, was that the Leviathans of Waimea couldn’t be surfed or survived: at once unridden and unrideable. An ominous mystique surrounded the Bay as a place that was not only haunted by ancient Uhane (ghosts) and swarming with ravenous sharks, but also the spot where Dickie Cross drowned (lost at sea: no body was found) back in 1943. Cross and his comrade Woody Brown had to paddle three miles down the coast from massive, closed-out Sunset Beach only to find, as the sun set, that the Bay itself was also shutting down. Giant 60’-plus faced waves detonated a half-mile outside the beach, the Bay itself a roiling cauldron of deadly rips. Brown chanced paddling in between the gigantic sets and somehow got washed in (naked) sans board in the misty twilight; whereas Cross was never seen again. The prevailing wisdom thereafter was that Waimea was off-limits, not worth the risk.

That all changed one halcyon afternoon in the Fall (November 5) of 1957. Some of the boys, including Greg Noll, Mike Stang, Micky Munoz, Diffenderfer, and Curren, among others, were sitting in their jalopies looking at relatively smooth, clean inviting peaks outside the point of Waimea Bay and decided to give it a shot. It was by no means giant or death-defying, but it was a major step forward in the progression of big-wave riding. After they paddled out and caught (although didn’t really make) a few waves, the spell had been broken.

Despite their best efforts, however, most everyone either got pitched over the falls, pearled, or, if they made the drop, their crude, straight (rockerless) longboards popped out of the water. No one actually made a wave. Curren realized immediately that he (and the rest) needed something even more refined and specialized in order to successfully surf these big waves. The “ultimate gun” was required; and Pat was the man to make it.

Echoing Brewer’s testimony, Peter Cole affirmed that “Pat was the first guy to produce the ultimate gun [before Brewer and Diffenderfer]. Joe Quigg and Bob Sheppard were making nice boards for all-around surfing, but Pat made the stiletto, specifically for Waimea, where you go from Point A to Point B on the biggest wave that comes through.” If one was serious about catching and successfully riding the biggest waves, one required a Curren gun. It was as simple as that. Pat forged the path that all the rest would follow in the years to come. “No question about it,” certified Ricky Grigg: “He was the best shaper. Number one. He had a real concept of the elephant gun. First guy to shape it, first guy to ride it. He was so respected, he had a cult following. He was a guru.” Top Gun. Non Plus Ultra.

A reluctant, recalcitrant guru at that. Never one to seek the limelight or court photographers and attention, Curren nevertheless was thrust into the role of a leader, as Homer’s Peleus – valorous father of Achilles – said of his outstanding son: “always out front, the best, outstripping others.6 Leader of the pack. “He didn’t want to be, though,” Peter Cole noted. “That was the amazing thing. He did not want to be a leader. I think guys just gravitated to him.”  

Not only quiet, he was often silent. The enigmatic Curren would go for an entire day without saying a word. Nor was he the robust physical specimen that, for example, Buzzy Trent exemplified with his chiseled physique and ripped muscles. Doyle (a self-styled golden-boy) brazenly described Curren as “gaunt and pale, with a pointed chin, sunken cheeks, and worried eyes . . . real quiet and moody.7 Perhaps it was an off day, hungover; in the photos I’ve seen of the young Pat, he looks ripped, vigorous, and strong. He was also one with the ladies, according to Fred Van Dyke, who reported that “he had an incredible effect on women . . . they’d just fall apart” in his presence. Notwithstanding his modesty, reticence, and reserve, Curren was also renowned as sly, playful, and funny, sharply witted, always up for a prank.

Many of the North Shore pioneers trained regularly, obsessively one might say, and worked hard to stay in top shape. The Adonis Buzzy Trent was perhaps the best exemplar of such rigorous practice — one of the original “Surf Muscles” (cf. ironmen past & present such as “Tarzan” Smith, Jeff Hakman, Sam Hawk, Laird Hamilton) – but there were others, including paddle-board champions Tom Zahn and Doyle, as well as the burly Van Dyke, who would train together during the Summer at Ala Moana in Town when the surf was flat, racing each other on paddle-boards, swimming laps, and sprinting the beach.

True to form, the nonconformist Curren wasn’t a fitness freak, regardless of the fact that he could free-dive to depths of 60’ or more and handle himself confidently in heavy water situations. He preferred cigarettes, cold beer, and a barbeque on the beach of fish or fowl he freshly caught to harried calisthenics, tedious beach runs, and running out of breath. Altogether disinterested, the self-deprecating Curren described himself as a “shitty athlete.”8

One afternoon, however, enjoying a cool two-beer afternoon buzz, Curren took a long draw on his cigarette, stubbed the butt into the sand and challenged the plucky teetotaler Tommy Zahn to a paddle competition. The vivacious Zahn laughed in his face and accepted the dare with a dismissive snark. Curren proceeded to smoke the vainglorious jock, leaving Zahn sucking wind in his wake as Pat pulled hard across the Ala Wai. Chastened and defeated, Zahn was mortified, on the verge of tears. When Pat got back to shore, he kicked back, cracked another brew, and sparked a Lucky Strike.

So it went for the next several years, during which time the quietly reserved Curren ascended and was recognized by all as the undisputed “King of the Bay.” Waimea Bay. Top Gun. Non Plus Ultra.

There were standout days, such as January 10, 1958, when the Bay reached epic closeout conditions (30’ plus = 60’ plus faces) as big and rideable as it gets. A few days later (Jan. 13-14), the entire North Shore washed out (40’ or more) and Point Surf Makaha came alive for the intrepid few. Curren was the standout surfer on the Bay day; John Severson at Makaha. Not surprisingly, Curren considered those years in the late ‘50s – pristine empty lineups with no crowds, cheap rent, an ocean teeming with an abundance of free food, and an endless supply of powerful, perfect waves — as being the “best time of my life.”

Curren met a gal named Jeanine in 1960 and they married the next year. She would, in her words, inevitably “steer his energy away from the North Shore.” They were married in a small, private ceremony at Maile Point on the Westside with a few local Hawaiians, including Sammy Lee (who loaned Pat his tuxedo jacket, which was a little too big for the groom), his best man Jose Angel,9 and Buzzy Trent in attendance. The surf was pumping that day, so after the ceremony, guns stuffed in the back of his woody, Pat along with his newlywed, Sammy, the Angel and Trent families headed back to the North Shore to surf Waimea Bay. Jeannie remembers that she “spent my wedding day wondering if my husband was going to come back alive.”10

A year or so later, as the North Shore became increasingly popular, busier with crowds of surfers, more and more people settling, putting down roots, and building homes, Pat (now 30 years old) was over the hype and ready for a change. He felt like he had achieved what he needed in terms of both his surfing and shaping aspirations; there was nothing else to prove. He determined that: “The Islands were too crowded . . . and I was getting ready to do something else. I’d done everything I wanted to do there. I pretty much gave up surfing in 1962.” The Currens moved back to the mainland.

They settled in Newport, where they had their first son. His name was Tom and he would go on to become one of the greatest surfers of all time, a three-time world champion, as well as an accomplished musician; one of the most revered figures in surfing history.11 Owl told me a funny story about the day Tom was born. In July of 1964, the not quite 14-year old Craig (a.k.a. Owl) was a full-on surf-stoked gremmie, living in Costa Mesa, across the Coast Highway from the beach. He, his older brother Gary (a.k.a. “Chappy”) along with some friends (including Dave Abbott, Walter Visolay, and Mike Taylor), had a little club-house, called “The Shack,” near the beach in Newport (30^th / 40^th Street?) which they built together, where they’d hang out, smoke cigarettes and the occasional “reefer” between surf sessions. Pat had a shaping room and surf-shop next door to the groms’ “Shack.” One afternoon that summer, the day before the Fourth of July, Curren ambled in, covered in foam and sawdust, bummed a cigarette from one of the kids, sparked up and sat there a while silently, then stated brusquely: “My wife just had a kid.” The way Owl tells the story, Pat didn’t seem all that thrilled about the event. Truth is often stranger than fiction.

Not long afterwards, the Currens relocated up the Coast to Santa Barbara, in Carpenteria. They had another boy named Joe in 1974; a sister Anna was born some years after that. Pat gradually found his way back to the ocean and surfing in the ‘70s, enjoying the waves with his son Tom (for whom he built custom surfboards) at the fabled points of the region: Hammonds, Rincon, El Capitan, the Ranch.12 Tom remembers:

My dad really went out of his way for us to see different parts of the world. Hiking, horseback-riding, we did all this stuff. He definitely enriched our lives . . . and especially me because I was the oldest. That influenced me, at least with my own kids to show them things that might jar them in a pleasant way . . . He got me surfing . . .

Meanwhile, Jeannie found Jesus and religion; while the burgeoning adolescent Tom discovered, among other things, marijuana, as well as his independence. Frustrated and feeling penned in by various pressures of society and the challenges of family life, Pat withdrew. Jeannie lamented that “he saw our life as an impossible situation. I could sense the sadness come over him.”

He made a toolbox, put his tools in it and said “goodbye” . . . He was discouraged; and he didn’t know what else to do, so he went out into the wilderness . . . his pride — that’s what keeps him there.

The marriage fell apart in 1981. “We could see it coming,” said Tom. “I was surfing all over California at the time and didn’t see him that much, and I handled it fine. When you’re seventeen years old, it isn’t a major trauma. It was hard on him though. Hardest thing he’d ever been through.” Pat split South to Costa Rica, where he enjoyed a surfing Renaissance in Central America long before the invasion of hordes of ex-pats and tourists.

In the late ‘80s, he migrated back up to the Southern tip of Baja, on the East Cape. I remember hearing hushed, word-of-mouth stories trickling in through the “coconut wireless” during the early ‘90s (around the time I first beheld that beautiful gun in JR’s shop) of Curren living solo out of his camper-truck, surfing perfect, hollow rights at a fabled “secret spot” called Boca de Tule. He lived the life of loner exile for years, surfing the early morning glass until it blew out and tooling on boats. A legend.13

He would have a fourth child, a daughter named Maile, some years later. Pat found his way back Stateside and began shaping custom surfboards for those who could find him and afford his rarefied, multi-stringered balsa guns, in addition to scaled-down miniature replicas of the real thing. Although the surfboards sold for as much as $25K each (a few hundred a pop for the little guys), Pat never seemed to have much money and remained in a perpetual state of pecuniary need. A few years ago (2020), his son Joe lamented:

Yes, it’s true, he struggle[ed] financially. The truth is, this ha[d] been going on for a long time. . .  We love and care about my dad very much . . . [and] we’ve always respected my dad’s wish to keep this kind of stuff private . . . My brother Tom and I, my sisters Anna and Maile, my dad’s brothers Mike and Terry and the entire family have all been trying to help him, doing the best we can, for years and years. It has been challenging and complicated; and we always run into a major road block.

The last couple of decades saw Curren traversing back and forth across the border, always close to the ocean, struggling perennially to elude the crowd and live life on his own terms. Pat himself put it like this: “We keep gettin’ pushed into these little corners. The last time I surfed Malibu had to be 1952. Couldn’t believe how crowded it was. Never went back. La Jolla got all fucked up, then Hawaii, then Costa Rica. I’m runnin’ out of places. Then again, I’m runnin’ out of time.”

§ § §

Epilogue:

In my surfing life I’ve had the profound privilege and pleasure of meeting and surfing with many icons of surfing. Some of them, such as Peter Cole and Ricky Grigg, I even got to know and called friends. I’ve learned valuable lessons from each in various ways, more than grateful to share the lineup and some insights. Yet, there are two guys that stand head and shoulders above the rest, in terms of the awe and gratitude inspired in me: Dick Brewer and Pat Curren. These two surfer-shapers achieved and contributed more to the legacy of what’s been made possible in giant waves of consequence than anyone else I can think of — Pat lit the proverbial torch (in terms of pushing the envelope of big-wave-riding shaping and surfing potential) and passed the torch to RB, who grabbed it and took off running . . . The rest is history.14

We lost them both in the past year, along with many others, notably including Paul Gebauer, Joe Quigg, and Greg Noll, each and all of whom were both friends and admirers of Pat. Seasons change. The Moon wanes. Tides ebb. The Sun sets . . . Eternal recurrence of the same.15

Patrick King Currren died on Sunday, January 22, 2023.16 It was an exceptional day. Powerful, glorious, and ferocious. The surf on Oahu was giant and Waimea came alive, really showed its teeth. It was absolutely pumping 20’-25’ (occasionally bigger) from dawn until dusk. Biggest, cleanest, meanest Waimea in decades, almost, truth be told, too big.17 The Pat Curren Swell? Why not. Sounds about right.

It was an Epic Day of surf. Perfect offshore conditions Island Wide all day long. While I attempted to ride gaping 15’-20’ Point Surf Makaha,18 they held the “Eddie Aikau Invitational” and local-boy lifeguard, underground charger Luke Shepardson won the event in classic, Pat Curren form — a quiet, deserving, homegrown underdog defeated or overcame the best of the best: John Florence, Mark Healey, Billy Kemper, et al. All of them links in a chain that extend back directly to Pat Curren, the original King of the Bay. The First Top Gun. He was 90 years old.

We are all born to die. Perhaps the only certainty there is in this existential Odyssey we call life. It’s what one does between birth and death that marks the significance and quality of existence. In the case of Pat Curren, he accomplished some things rather extraordinary, singular, truly heroic, and simply beautiful on his own terms in his own time, just like those big, beautiful, blue waves he courageously charged and that exquisite balsa gun I saw in Jack’s shop over 30 years ago.

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu

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Acknowledgements: Many of the quotes were drawn from previous publications on the established record, such as Bruce Jenkins “Father, Son, Holy Spirit,” Surfer Magazine, Vol. 36, No. 8 (1995); Malcolm Gault-Williams “Pat Curren, King of The Bay,” (2011); Flippy Hoffman “The Wild Frontier,” Surfing Magazine, (volume, number, year unknown), as well as from various other articles and book sources that have informed my memory and recollections (although I did not directly reference them when writing this tribute). I should also like to express my gratitude to Anna Trent Moore and her husband Ron Moore for graciously sharing and allowing me to include a couple photographs shot by Bud Browne ©Bud Browne Film Archives. I remain grateful to my friends Jack Reeves, Emily Erickson, and Peter Maguire for their input and advice. Finally, I should thank Ricardo Pomar for sharing with me his memories and a photograph of that exquisite board I saw in Jack’s shop so many years ago.

1

Interview with Tom Curren (December 15, 2016): St. Onge (STO): Did you ever come to the North Shore with your dad? CURREN: He came one year again. Not so long ago. It was about 1999. STO: When you were riding his board? CURREN: Yeah! STO: I remember that. You were riding one of his guns. Was that one of the original guns? CURREN: No. It was a reissue. Just a little narrower. STO: I remember that. I also recall that Ricardo Pomar had one of your dad’s original guns, back when Jack’s shop was still down at Rockies. Ricardo had Jack and Diff retrofit it. I was enthralled by that surfboard. It was just so beautiful. But the round bottom was . . . CURREN: A problem, yeah. The belly thing. STO: Too much belly. But otherwise, it was just so beyond anything else at the time. CURREN: Yeah, that’s true, especially the back part of it, when you get it up on rail. I think the bottom near the tail was just flat. STO: Rounded belly into a flat panel. But that tail, though . . . the original Buzzy Trent guns looked a lot like the Curren guns, especially in the tail. Just super pulled in. Simply beautiful. CURREN: Yeah I know. I know. And they still are. STO: Do you still have any of your dad’s boards? CURREN: Yes. I have that one, the wood one. And I have a foam board. And I have one that he made for that first trip I came over here with the NSSA [in 1981]. But it was a mini gun version, like a Brewer. Narrow. Real flat. And I couldn’t . . . you know, I was trying to figure out how to surf Sunset. And the board didn’t have a leash plug and, like, I was trying. It was really fast . . .  STO: Single fin? CURREN: Yeah!  STO: Interesting. How big was it? CURREN: I think it was like seven six? Something like that. Yeah, it was pretty interesting.  STO: You still have that board? CURREN: Yes I do. STO: When was the last time you rode that? CURREN:  Back then, back in the . . . ah, but, umm, no. Actually, I did try it again once a few years ago actually.  STO: On the mainland? CURREN: It doesn’t really work very well actually. It’s just very, very straight. Very, you know . . . basically it’s for just taking off late, making the bottom turn, and holding a line, and making it through the end of the wave. And for that, it’s the classic criticism of my dad’s boards. STO: Point and go. CURREN: Some of that, yeah, point and go, which is the criticism that some of the guys were making, because when they took the boards he made for them back to Australia, wherever, they couldn’t do turns like they could on their other regular boards. But, you know, that’s. . . time. STO: But when it comes to this kind of thing, you know, it works pretty well . . .  [pointing to classic Bud Browne photograph of his father, Pat Curren, at giant Waimea Bay – SEE: Surfer Magazine Vol. 36, No. 3, 1995] CURREN:  So, time kind sorted it all out, you know, the reality and all that. (SEE also: ^[1] Interview with Tom Curren (December 15, 2016): St. Onge (STO): Did you ever come to the North Shore with your dad? CURREN: He came one year again. Not so long ago. It was about 1999. STO: When you were riding his board? CURREN: Yeah! STO: I remember that. You were riding one of his guns. Was that one of the original guns? CURREN: No. It was a reissue. Just a little narrower. STO: I remember that. I also recall that Ricardo Pomar had one of your dad’s original guns, back when Jack’s shop was still down at Rockies. Ricardo had Jack and Diff retrofit it. I was enthralled by that surfboard. It was just so beautiful. But the round bottom was . . . CURREN: A problem, yeah. The belly thing. STO: Too much belly. But otherwise, it was just so beyond anything else at the time. CURREN: Yeah, that’s true, especially the back part of it, when you get it up on rail. I think the bottom near the tail was just flat. STO: Rounded belly into a flat panel. But that tail, though . . . the original Buzzy Trent guns looked a lot like the Curren guns, especially in the tail. Just super pulled in. Simply beautiful. CURREN: Yeah I know. I know. And they still are. STO: Do you still have any of your dad’s boards? CURREN: Yes. I have that one, the wood one. And I have a foam board. And I have one that he made for that first trip I came over here with the NSSA [in 1981]. But it was a mini gun version, like a Brewer. Narrow. Real flat. And I couldn’t . . . you know, I was trying to figure out how to surf Sunset. And the board didn’t have a leash plug and, like, I was trying. It was really fast . . .  STO: Single fin? CURREN: Yeah!  STO: Interesting. How big was it? CURREN: I think it was like seven six? Something like that. Yeah, it was pretty interesting.  STO: You still have that board? CURREN: Yes I do. STO: When was the last time you rode that? CURREN:  Back then, back in the . . . ah, but, umm, no. Actually, I did try it again once a few years ago actually.  STO: On the mainland? CURREN: It doesn’t really work very well actually. It’s just very, very straight. Very, you know . . . basically it’s for just taking off late, making the bottom turn, and holding a line, and making it through the end of the wave. And for that, it’s the classic criticism of my dad’s boards. STO: Point and go. CURREN: Some of that, yeah, point and go, which is the criticism that some of the guys were making, because when they took the boards he made for them back to Australia, wherever, they couldn’t do turns like they could on their other regular boards. But, you know, that’s. . . time. STO: But when it comes to this kind of thing, you know, it works pretty well . . .  [pointing to classic Bud Browne photograph of his father, Pat Curren, at giant Waimea Bay – SEE: Surfer Magazine Vol. 36, No. 3, 1995] CURREN:  So, time kind sorted it all out, you know, the reality and all that.

(SEE also:

Eternal Return

Le Dîner de Cons

Tennis has Bjorn Borg. World Cup downhill ski racing has Ingemar Stenmark. Paragons of strength, grace and expertise — exemplars of the effortless mastery of their sport — they were in their primes and remain today among the greatest athletes in history, representing timeles…

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5 years ago · 6 likes · 3 comments · Andy St. Onge

4

Cole: “To me, quantity means nothing at Waimea. If you get the biggest wave out there, you’ve won the day. And Pat had that over all of us. He never advertised it, either. Never had a media following. The rest of us were running around, you know, ‘Did you get that picture?’ while he’d just sitting way outside, and all of a sudden the set of the day comes, and he’s on the damn thing. Used to drive me insane. My first couple of winters out there, Pat gave me an inferiority complex.”

5

The “shot heard (and seen) round the world,” as it were, was taken by Thomas “Scoop” Tsuzuki of three surfers (Woody Brown, George Downing, and Buzzy Trent) dropping into a clean “15 foot wave” at Point Surf Makaha and published first in the Honolulu Advertiser, later by the AP across America (from California, to Nevada, Wisconsin, and beyond) in November 1953. A strong case can be made that this photo changed the lives of scores, if not hundreds, of surfers on “The Coast” (California) and spurred their migration to The Islands – specifically Oahu, first to the Westside (where Makaha is located) and then to the mysterious, foreboding North Shore “Country.” This photograph took surfing worldwide and represents a paradigm shift in the popular awareness of surfing, especially regarding big wave riding.

6

The cigar-chewing Dale “TheHawk” Velzy was the first commercial shaper and retailer of surfboards, also the first to “hang ten” surfing. He started surfing in Hermosa Beach, as well as shaping and repairing boards under the pier in the 1940s. Later, in the 1950s, he opened one of the first surf shops with his partner Hap Jacobs, under the label/brand “Velzy-Jacobs Surfboards” in Manhattan Beach, a leading label of the Golden Era of longboarding. Velzy also had a surfshop on the North Shore in the 1950s and often surfed a shallow reef Northeast of Sunset Beach, in Kaunala Bay, that came to be known as “Velzyland” (aka: “V-Land”).

10

Pat said that “Jose Angel was the toughest guy I ever knew.”

13

Cf.

Eternal Return

Le Dîner de Cons

Tennis has Bjorn Borg. World Cup downhill ski racing has Ingemar Stenmark. Paragons of strength, grace and expertise — exemplars of the effortless mastery of their sport — they were in their primes and remain today among the greatest athletes in history, representing timeles…

Read more

5 years ago · 6 likes · 3 comments · Andy St. Onge

15

Cf.

Eternal Return

"Surfing Is The Most Beautiful Thing You Can Do"

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4 years ago · 7 likes · 3 comments · Andy St. Onge

Paul Gebauer ascended peacefully last September at the age of 80. Prior to that, after walking away from surfing and the crowds of Oahu, he lived alone, outside under Ka La (the Sun) and Hoku (stars) in Wao Akua (mountain wilderness — home of Gods) of Upcountry Maui in the volcanic crater of Haleakala — at an elevation of 10,000’! — for thirty years or more. He spent his days wandering, walking in silence; and in deep, concentrated meditation.

Paul was a quiet, courageous mystic and perhaps the first surfer (in modern times) to both look and feel totally comfortable and at ease on the otherwise formidable and often terrifying waves of Paumalu (Sunset Beach). Where others crouched in a survival squat, Paul stood tall, loose and lithe, literally dancing where the rest were stiff, stumbled, or staggered. Kimo Hollinger, his boyhood friend from Punahou days and comrade in arms pioneer big-wave rider on the North Shore, reflected that “Paul was ahead of his time” and “he will always be my Mr. Sunset.”

A kinesthetic genius, his surfing wasn’t merely athletic (indeed Olympic) but art — both a reflection and extension of his musical, poetic mind and spirit. He made it beautiful because he felt the majesty and beauty of it all. Brewer said as much, too: “Surfing is the most beautiful thing one you can do.”1 And Paul was the most elegant of his generation, a forbear of other style master big-wave surf muscles like Sam Hawk and Eric Haas.

Paul’s wave riding looked — and probably felt — like the wafting flamenco classical/jazz riffs he mastered on guitar. Think (and listen to) Alhambra (Andreas Segovia) and feel the soul.

The sound of genius in unrestrained free form fluid bliss . . . Paul wrote poetry as well, not surprisingly; and in a poem entitled “A Tube In The Spine,” he waxed lyrical:

There is a tube in the spine

it’s all yours and it’s all mine

There is never a crowd and

you can find it anytime, this oh so slippery tube in the spine.

So slide a hot curl on a thruster of meditation, transcending forever all crowded frustration

Cut back and stall, relish perfection

Plunge once again through diverse dimension

Carve a slick wall beyond time

and space to the source of all swells that gave you a face.

Not even six fins, or even a board

Just a little patience and trust in the Lord.

Add a little love for the source of all waves, tis all the wax you’ll need till the end of your days.

Ten toes on the nose is good for a starter, perhaps some day you’ll walk on the water.

It’s all so divine so utterly sublime

when you draw a line through the tube on the spine.

Froth of foam bubbles of mirth

Isn’t it great just to surf?

I plan to write a comprehensive retrospective on Paul and have been conducting extensive research in preparation for that project, including interviews with people who knew him, such as his younger sister, Susan Gebauer Brown on Maui. Susan has graciously shared some of Paul’s writings and poems with me and I remain grateful to her and her family. More to come on Paul soon. A Hui Hou!

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu 2022

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Eternal Return

"Surfing Is The Most Beautiful Thing You Can Do"

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4 years ago · 7 likes · 3 comments · Andy St. Onge

The Memorial for Peter Cole at Sunset Beach this past Saturday morning was halcyon and sublime. It all came together in a rather appropriate, organic way, Hawaiian style, with people, family, friends, surfing icons, and peers gradually showing up spontaneously from all over Oahu and elsewhere, far and wide. There was a Polynesian Outrigger Sailing Wa’a (canoe) moored in the channel, the same one at Derek Ho’s Memorial last summer down at Pipeline.1 Around 9:30 a.m., I paddled a white 11’ three stringer down the beach from where I live on Sunset Point, stashed my board on the beach in the naupaka, and crossed the Kam Highway to a large tent set up for the Memorial in the park.

People were gathering and talking story. Lots of familiar faces. Ken Bradshaw and Butch Perriera were discussing the “best day” ever at Sunset — October 4, 1976 — and agreed that they’d never seen or surfed anything quite like that outstanding 15’ North-Northwest before or since: confirmation of Peter’s judgment from two of the most seasoned, experienced surfers ever at Paumalu.2 Peter always loved that NNW direction, with the long wall stretching from Outside Boneyards off the Point (really Second/Third Reef Backyards) winding all the way through a myriad of sections — the North Point, Saddle, West Peak, & Inside Bowl — into the channel way outside the lifeguard tower. Anyone who’s seen or ridden one of these Leviathans won’t forget it. Pure stoke.

The Cole family (at least three generations) — Peter’s wife Sally, their sons Peter & Doug, and Peter’s eldest son, over from the Big Island, the renown waterman, Ka’aina, and the grandchildren — was assembled beneath the tent, welcoming and speaking graciously with guests, young and old, as they arrived and paid their respects, the keikis running circles amongst the seats and crowd. Peter’s stepdaughter Kaulana sat front and center in the grass. Looking around, I recognized many of those that compose and define the sociology and history of the North Shore, a rich, varied tapestry of characters from within and around the rural, residential community that revolves, in one way or another, around surfing. Paumalu is the epicenter. Everyone was smiling, happy, relaxed and convivial. No tears, at least not yet.

Douglass V.Z. Cole, Peter’s youngest, served as the informal MC. Reserved, dignified, eloquent, and in control, he reminded me of his father with a deep baritone and calm assurance that everything would proceed according to plan. Peter’s quiver of yellow guns was prominently and carefully strapped to the tent poles on each side, representing pillars, a distinguished tribute to decades of surfing history: Eaton, Brewer, Diffenderfer, Chapman, Andrus, Bradshaw, Walden, Bushman, Willis Bros., Y-Ban, and more stood proudly in Stoic, silent homage to a rich surfing life. I recognized many of the boards and recalled the hundreds — no thousands — of sessions I had the pleasure and privilege of sharing with Peter, a joy that many of those in attendance also shared.

The PA was whining with high-pitched feedback. No big deal. We could still hear what was said clear enough. Peter’s younger brother, Lucky, spoke at length. The Cole kindness, wit, and intelligence were on full display, as Lucky reflected on the dynamic between his older twin brothers, Corny and Peter, who were so small when born that they both “fit in a shoebox.”

He began with an analogy to ping-pong, telling us that Corny (a famous, award-winning artist) was a “sinker and slider”; whereas, on the other hand, Peter was the “slammer” (at least that’s what I think he said), in that Corny’s rather more nuanced approach to the game was contrasted by Peter’s raw powerful style (or lack thereof). This distinction apparently carried over into other activities, such as boxing. Corny was known for a method of combining a flurry of rapid jabs with inside cuts — he was a pressure fighter or “swarmer” — compared with Peter, who was a rather more aggressive brute, a “slugger” that threw wild haymakers and aimed for maximum impact. However, in Lucky’s considered estimation, Corny out-boxed his twin more often than not, to the everlasting frustration and chagrin of Peter.

Lucky declared that Peter was “more of a mentor” to him than Corny, for Peter inspired his youngest brother with a unique combination of courage, passion, humor, humility, and integrity, especially when it came to surfing, swimming, and competition. The deep love and admiration he had for Peter was palpable. Lucky observed that if the notorious Greg Noll (another fellow big-wave pioneer) was “The Bull,” then Peter was “The Lion” — the one who waited patiently, like a lone predator, for the best, biggest waves furthest outside at Paumalu and Waimea Bay. Lucky concluded with the insight that “Peter left a good wake behind him,” one that we all can draft and draw upon.

Peter’s tall, beautiful wife, Sally, draped in leis, spoke next. Not one to mince words or get too sentimental, she simply, succinctly stated that her husband “had a happy life” and “that he enjoyed all of your company . . . he really did.” Poignant, sweet, and true: a “happy life” — Eudaimonia — indeed.3 One can’t hope or ask for more.

Peter’s longtime surfing partner and neighbor, Jim Blattau — one of the truly great underground big-wave riders of all time in my book4 — reminisced on how he and Peter “slept in their cars on Ke Nui Road” back in the late 1950s (“when a beachfront lot sold for $2000, if you can believe that”); and how Peter and his friends (Fred Van Dyke and Ricky Grigg) essentially hanaied (adopted) Jim into a big-wave fraternity that he described as “family.” Jim’s gentle words touched me unexpectedly and a tear welled in my eye as he proclaimed a deep love and admiration for his “friend and mentor,” one he sorely missed.

Larry McElheny, another of Peter’s friends and a leading North Shore community activist, recalled his colleague’s strength, integrity, and civic virtue. Peter’s stepdaughter Kaulana, warmly related further how caring and protective her “father” was of her, teaching her to swim, read, and eat her vegetables (while arguing with the Hawaiian grandmother about something silly). Peter’s eldest son, Ka’aina — one of the most respected fishermen and divers in the Hawaiian Islands — shared fond memories of being “born and raised on the beach,” tumbling in the shore-break out front of the house before he could even walk. And Peter (the son, Sally’s eldest) spoke purely and profoundly of his father’s legacy in terms of the positive, edifying impact his father had on family and friends alike.

I scanned the crowd of faces and noticed Clyde Aikau sitting by himself, looking fit, proud, and healthy (he’s almost 72), listening intently. It was obvious to me that he was feeling the Mana (spiritual power) of the moment and that he was thinking hard. Clyde’s an intense person, another one of the true legends and greats of Hawaiian big-wave surfing history, along with his brother, of course: Eddie. Clyde is essentially the closest thing we have to living Ali’i Nui (great chief or noble leader), revered and respected by all.5 I could see that Clyde wanted to say or do something, so it seemed perfectly natural (to me) when he rose and approached the tent. My eyes followed him as he made his way toward the family and he said something to Doug, who immediately introduced Clyde.

This was the best, most moving part, in my opinion — a full-on chicken skin moment — as Clyde, speaking soulfully, began: “Two young Hawaiians, Eddie Aikau and myself, Clyde Aikau.” His was a heartfelt testimony to the “inspiration” Peter afforded two kids as they watched surf movies at the Waikiki Shell back in the mid 1960s (“66-67”). Just watch and listen to the video above . . . it will touch and teach you plenty, as Clyde recounts, with tears of gratitude and joy, how “the inspiration for Eddie and my myself came from Peter Cole and another Hawaiian surfer, Kealoha Kaio. These two guys inspired Eddie and myself to ride big waves.”6 That’s a huge declaration coming from a peerless authority. With genuine affection and admiration, Clyde reflected on his and Eddie’s experience surfing Sunset with Peter, waiting each day for Sally and Peter to come walking casually down the beach (Peter, said Clyde, was “a take your time guy” —no rush) before they all paddled out together “and surfed all day long.” Clyde went on:

Trying to be a part of the big-wave crew in the early days wasn’t the easiest thing . . . you was in or you was out. And Peter was instrumental in bringing Eddie and me into the realm of big-wave riding with everybody else. You know, in life, we’re all gonna reach that day when it’s time for us to leave. But what I think is really important is that you can leave something that can inspire people — you can inspire them to be a better person, a better athlete. I think that that is what really, really matters to Eddie and my family. We can leave when it’s time for us and to leave this world a little better place . . . Mahalo and Aloha Nō.

Sounded like something Peter might say himself . . . Authentic and true. I am quite certain that Clyde’s impromptu tribute to Peter Cole was the most important and beautiful testimony that I have ever witnessed in my surfing experience. His thoughtful reflections reminded and reinforced for me that we are all but links in a chain that extends for all eternity through time and space. Although here now but for a moment, the legacy of love, passion, and integrity from people like Peter (Clyde, Eddie . . . and on and on) transcends all limits or constraints of mortality or finitude in ways that can and will inspire generations to come. Mahalo and Aloha Nō.

With that said and done, we gathered our boards and paddled out to celebrate the life of a true legend as his ashes were scattered in the sacred waters — Mana Kai — of Paumalu.

Ho‘ohihi ko‘u mana‘o ‘eā

I ko leo ma ke kelepona

E haha‘i ana i kō moe ‘ole i ka pō

A ka hana nui a loko

E lauwiliwili nei

Aloha nō, aloha nō, aloha nō

‘O ‘oe ku‘u lei, ku‘u mili ē

He aloha nā maka i ka haka pono mai

Ua ‘ike au he ‘i‘ini kou na‘u

Ma ku‘u poli mai ‘oe

E nanea ai kāua

Aloha nō, aloha nō, aloha nō.

Aloha ‘Oe, Peter — Aloha Nō

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu 2022

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Eternal Return

Derek Ho Day 2021

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5 years ago · 8 likes · 3 comments · Andy St. Onge

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Daniel Kealoha Kaio of Laie/Kahuku (Northeast Oahu) was born in 1935 and began surfing in 1958, the year Peter arrived on the North Shore. Kealoha soon became a regular out at Paumalu and by 1963 was one of the best, a strong, courageous, elegant surfer, who was admired by all for his control and style. Kealoha, a commercial fisherman by trade, was also an admired Hawaiian musician and singer, known for a beautiful falsetto voice. I have had the pleasure of having both Kealoha’s grandson (Kealoha III) and greatgrandson (Kealoha IV) as students at Kahuku High School — both of whom look just like Kealoha Senior and are outstanding football players. I surfed Sunset with Kealoha Senior a couple of times back in the 1990s, which was something I’ll never forget and always cherish.

As a follow-up addendum to last month’s tribute to shaping guru Dick Brewer, please see the following interview recorded in 2007 in his shaping room at Paumalu, in which he sets the record straight.

https://www.swellnet.com/news/swellnet-dispatch/2022/06/06/listen-the-dick-brewer-interview

Highlights include:

00.45 Big Wave Design - how its changed.
02.00 Waimea Gun
02.25 Tow Boards with Darrick & Laird
05.05 The Beginning - the early days for Dick
06.10 building engines for drag boats in his teen years
07.20 Moving to Hawaii in 61 and starting SURFBOARDS HAWAII
08.22 You don’t refuse 'Buffalo’ Keaulana a board
09.45 SURFBOARDS HAWAII
10.05 Bob Shepherd
11.00 Bing Pipeliner with Bing, Butch Van Artsdalen in 1962
12.47 The most influential surfer?
14.11 Midget Farrelly - Joey Cabell - Fred Hemmings
15.20 Surfboards Hawaii
16.25 Jeff Hackman
18.08 Duke Kahanamoku
19.13 Buzzy Trent
19.37 Jim Mizel
19.53 Building concave boards for Vetea David - Teahupoo
20.07 Laird Hamilton, Darrick Doerner & Buzzy Kerbox - towing in at Backyards in 1992
20.33 Jaws
20.55 Poto/Teahupoo
21.15 Built a tow board for Laird/Jaws
22.30 Tow-in boards - the designs
24.06 Laird Hamilton
25.35 Eddie Aikau
26.06 Hackman and Hobie
26.26 Hobie
27.46 Bob McTavish
28.55 George Greenough
29.22 double barrel concave
30.35 V bottom
31.26 Ted Spencer and the mini malibu
33.40 Bob McTavish
35.22 Aussie square bottom
38.34 The short board revolution
39.14 Moving to Kauai
39.33 Test pilots - Reno, Lopez, Hakman then Terry Fitzgerald
40.05 Gary Chapman
40.20 Sammy Hawk
40.38 Reno Abellira
41.32 Pipeline boards
43.00 Mark Richards, shaping with Dick
45.37 Terry Fitzgerald
47.31 Business setbacks
47.51 Brewer sailboards
48.45 Tri-fin boards in 1971 - the 1+2 & the Ala Moana Bowls Contest 
50.15 Calling Steve Pezman
50.56 Conversation with Hobie
52.00 staying in the background
52.25 Gerry Lopez - copying his tow fins and sold them to Future Fins
53.45 Going to start Lightning Bolt Surfboards
55.24 Tow-in movement
56.20 Darrick Doerner
56.50 The best thing about surfing?
57.10 The essence of surfing
57.59 What is surfing?
58.09 The experience of surfing

The venerable Peter Van Zandt Cole passed away several months ago on February 5 (2022) at his home on the beach surrounded by his loving family after a long, illustrious life. This past year or so has been marked by the loss of many of the great surfing pioneers of big wave riding, notably including Dick Brewer, Paul Gebauer, Joe Quigg, and Greg Noll — each and all of whom were both contemporaries and friends of Peter. Like them, Peter deserves a distinguished place right at the top of the rank order of the North Shore surfing pantheon. He was one of a kind and his passing marks the end of a grand, now bygone era.

Peter was born in 1930 in Los Angeles to Marie and Cornelius Cole II, a stockbroker from a prominent family in Beverly Hills. His mother didn’t know she had twins in her womb, so when Peter popped out after Cornelius (“Corny”) III, it was an unexpected surprise. Corny and Peter were followed ten years later by Schuyler (“Lucky”), in that they felt “Lucky” to have such an unanticipated gift late in life. Thereafter, the Cole family moved from San Marino to San Vicente Blvd. near State Beach in Santa Monica, where the boys would frolic in the shorebreak.

Peter and Corny were introduced to surfing in 1945 by their neighbor, friend, and mentor Buzzy Trent, who, along with Kit Horn, took the Coles up the Coast Highway to the halcyon, unspoiled environs of Malibu. It was a magical time. At first, Corny and Peter shared a surfboard they found that had been abandoned by a WWII veteran, which they buried in the sand for safekeeping between surf sessions: “it was so heavy that Corny and I had to carry it to the water together.” It took Peter a few weeks to learn how to catch a wave without pearling, but, in between swims to the beach, he got the hang of it.

Not long after, Peter got his first custom surfboard — a hollow redwood plank: “it only weighed 50lbs.!” — from a scruffy, opinionated, somewhat surly loner named Bob Simmons,1 often referred to as “surfing’s only true genius” and one of the primary architects (along with Joe Quigg) of the modern surfboard.2 Peter was hooked and his love affair with the ocean and wave-riding was consummated at Malibu, where the soft, perfectly foiled point waves cultivated an easy-going style. Along with his brothers, Corny and Lucky, friends like Buzzy, Joe Quigg, Matt Kivlin, Tom Zahn, Simmons, and a cocky kid named Ricky Grigg, the beginnings of modern surfing took root.3 Peter was on his way to an inevitable destiny: the glory of Paumalu.

After graduating from Stanford with a degree in Art (minor in Math), Peter followed his friend Fred Van Dyke from Santa Cruz (where they surfed the big, cold waves of Steamer Lane and Pleasure Point together in the mid 1950s) to Honolulu. There, he took a job along with Van Dyke at an old prep school called Punahou. Like his surfing contemporaries Fred Van Dyke, Jose Angel, and, later, Ricky Grigg, Peter was an educator. At Punahou — former students include a who’s who of surfing history: Fred Hemmings, Paul Strauch, Jeff Hakman, Gerry Lopez, James Jones, and Jimmy Blears, among other surfing luminaries — Peter taught algebra. And he made the long commute each day from Country to Town, often in a convoy, along with Van Dyke and a fledgling Jeff Hakman.4 Peter remembered:

It could be a really bad drive, particularly if the weather was poor or there was

            an accident. The traffic would just pile up about five or six miles the Country

            side of Pearl City; and we’d be sitting there bumper to bumper, Fred wearing

            his gas mask. Sometimes there’d be three or four carloads of us and we knew

            a shortcut through the sugar cane fields. It was just a dirt track and we’d be

            hurtling along in a convoy. There was a chain across the track about halfway

            along, and the passenger in the first car would jump out and hold it up while

            all the cars went through, then jump back into the last car. You can imagine all

            this happening at a million miles an hour coming home on those winter

afternoons when there was big surf!

Although loved and respected by his students — Lopez declares “Peter was a sweet, kind, thoughtful man”; Hakman proclaims “Mr. Cole was my favorite teacher” — Peter lamented that he was a “screw up teacher, I always get more chalk on me than the chalkboard.”5 Ever the pragmatist with an eye for the next swell, he became frustrated with the long commutes and missing water time, so Peter quit Punahou and, in 1966, started as a systems analyst with the U.S. Naval Pacific Command, a job which crucially afforded him the flexibility of afternoons free to surf.

Once established on the North Shore, Peter started a family, among the first of the so-called “Coast Haoles” to settle in the remote, rural environs of Sunset Beach. He married a beautiful Hawaiian woman named Eno from Haleiwa, who had a daughter, Kaulana, from a previous marriage. Peter and Eno had a son, Ka’aina, who now lives on the Big Island of Hawaii. That marriage ended in divorce some years later. Peter then met Sally (née Martin) through a colleague at Punahou (Sally’s brother, Rogers Martin ) and the two fell in love. Sally and Peter married, built a house on the sand at Rocky Point in 1972, and had a son, Peter, the following year. A few years after that, Douglass was born.

Peter had a sense of civic virtue and was engaged with matters important to him. He was a leader of the North Shore community at the forefront of issues like education (he spearheaded the initiative to establish Sunset Beach Elementary School) and environmental conservation, founder of the Oahu Chapter of The Surfrider Foundation, the Save Sunset Beach coalition (which evolved into the North Shore Community Land Trust), and Save Our Surf with his friend John Kelly. “Peter’s legacy in surfing and conservation will live on through the protected coastal and ocean areas that he fought so hard to conserve; and by those who are following in his footsteps to protect Oahu’s ocean, waves, and beaches,” The Surfrider Foundation stated in a recent post on its website. As longtime North Shore resident and Sunset Beach stalwart Craig “Owl” Chapman puts it: “Peter was the voice of the North Shore that they heard in Town at the Capitol. Peter was our voice.”

Moreover, Peter was the voice of underground local surfers, the residents of Sunset Beach who worked, raised families, and loved surfing Paumalu. Peter forcefully, consistently, and persuasively spoke truth and justice to the various, shifting powers that be in local government as well as the nascent “surf industry” and associated pro surfing competitions. Contest Director Randy Rarick, one of Peter’s lifelong friends and erstwhile foils, fondly recalls a time during the World Cup event (“Billabong Pro”) at Sunset during the Triple Crown of Surfing in 1989, when there was a man-on-man heat (only two competitors in the water at a time). Randy related that:

Peter came storming into the judges’ area absolutely fuming! I was sitting there  

            with Al Hunt [head of the Association of Surfing Professionals] and Peter

raved on how it was an egregious waste of waves for only two guys to be out there

when the locals should have the right to surf where they live. As he made his case,

a set poured through the lineup — easy 10’-12’ perfect West Peaks — and,

low and behold, most of the waves went unridden. I just shook my head and said to

Al: “He’s right.” And that was the end of man-on-man heats at Sunset Beach. We

didn’t always agree or see eye to eye; but I respected Peter and valued his input. He

always defended what he believed in.

Peter explained to me that pro contests had permits only for the beach concession and that “no one has the right to tell you to leave the ocean.” The rule of law! The Magna Carta! I loved it! In such regard, Peter gave me both motivation and confidence to paddle out (at Sunset or Waimea — I paddled out to The Bay during the Eddie Aikau Contest with my friend Eric Haas in the early 2000s to the dismay of the Water Patrol) at 4 p.m. regardless of whether the contest was over or not knowing full well that I had the law — and Peter — on my side! We shared a playful, resolute rebelliousness that I will always treasure. Peter knew his place and taught me mine.

Under Peter’s tutelage with support from the local community, he helped to preserve the rural, residential, recreational integrity of the North Shore and keep commercial development at bay. To this day, every time I look to the arboreal bluffs above Sunset and Pupukea (where I often ride my mountain bike on a labyrinth of quiet wooded trails), I feel deep gratitude for what Peter saved from becoming a suburban wasteland of track homes and golf courses.

I admired Peter a great deal, although I kind of lost touch with him the past 15 or 20 years. Even though we live less than a mile down the beach from each other, him at Rocky Point on the sand, me at Sunset Point, Backyards, I haven’t seen him in the water surfing since the early 2000s, after he had a botched shoulder surgery that damaged his brachial plexus nerve, which impaired his ability to paddle a surfboard. His sight (Peter was blind in one eye, the result of a surfing accident in the early ‘70s — when he swam into the fin on his surfboard racing against Ricky Grigg at Sunset) and age had already made surfing more of a challenge and hazard anyway. Over the course of the last ten years or so, we’d cross paths occasionally when I’d bump into him walking the dog with his wife Sally, reminding me of his presence and depth. So went the gradual twilight of an extraordinary surfing life. It happens in one way or another to everyone, even and especially the greats. I’ve seen it before and will see it again. It’s the seasonal way of nature. Indeed, I recall Peter saying with a self-deprecating laugh: “We all start out as kooks; and we all end up kooks.”

§ § §

When I got to the North Shore in 1988 and first paddled out at Paumalu, Sunset Beach, I had the fortuitous opportunity — indeed the privilege and pleasure — of surfing with and learning from many of the greats of surfing, especially those that led the charge into big waves at Sunset Beach and Waimea Bay decades before in the 1950s and ‘60s. Right at the top of the hierarchy was Peter Cole, who at the time wasn’t much older than I am now. It was evident that Peter was recognized and admired by everyone as the unquestioned and otherwise unassuming Patriarch of Paumalu.

Every afternoon, like clockwork, sometime after two or so, Peter would amble down Ke Nui Road in his white T-shirt, red shorts, and yellow gun under his arm to Paumalu, where he’d check in with the lifeguards at Tower #25, stash his slippers, and paddle out to the lineup. Customarily, one and all would cheer his arrival, a charming daily occurrence. No one else got that kind of ovation, then or now, that’s for sure. Once in the lineup, Peter assumed his place furthest outside on the peak — pole position — and waited for the sets. No one challenged him for waves; he got whatever he wanted.

Peter was a powerful swimmer who never wore a leash, so when he wiped out or lost his board, he swam. At 6’4” tall with massive hands and feet, he moved through the water like Aquaman! At Stanford, he’d been “All-American” and, according to his brother Lucky, only missed making the U.S. Olympic Team by a fraction of second. Peter was probably the strongest swimmer in the water. He made it look both easy and fun.

That left a deep impression on me: I learned that an authentic Sunset Beach surfer doesn’t wear a “goon cord” and swims. Each and every swim like a deposit in the bank. I loved and embraced that truth. Honest, committed surfing without any accoutrements made one strong, confident, and comfortable in the ocean. “I refuse to wear a leash,” he said, “So I swim all the time.” His lifelong friend (and rival) Ricky Grigg —another one of my Paumalu mentors — who grew up with Peter in Santa Monica and came to Oahu around the same time recalled when they first surfed Sunset Beach together in 1958:

My first day out was with Peter, who also had just arrived from California . . .

            On that first day, Peter and I were out at Sunset, where it was 6 to 8 feet and

            about as big as I could handle. Late in the day, a few 10- to 12-foot, eye-popping

            sets came in. Later that winter, Peter and I would surf 12-to-15 foot waves with

            impunity, putting in six to eight hours in the water. Peter once made nineteen

            swims for his board (no leashes) in one day! And I was right behind him with

            seventeen. By the end of the year, we were in top shape.

Peter was very kind, generous, and patient with me, a young college student and aspiring novitiate full of hopes, piss, and vinegar. I spent countless hours and a couple decades surfing with him, talking story, absorbing the insights, knowledge, and wisdom, all of which deepened and enhanced the experience for me in a myriad of ways. Peter exemplified to me what was possible in a surfing life. Unlike most others, who had made radical, rather short-sighted sacrifices and compromises in order to fulfill or maintain their devotion to (or obsession with) the ocean and seemed, at least to me, dysfunctional or stunted, Peter enjoyed a full, rich, balanced existence. He was calm, thoughtful, and relaxed, always with an easy smile, where others appeared stressed and strained. When it came to waves, he sought quality not quantity, reflecting that “it’s not how many waves you got; it’s how many good ones.”6

Surfing was purely recreation for Peter — serious play, to be sure — but he had a life beyond surfing. Even though he won the 1958 Makaha International surf meet (and literally hung his trophy over Ricky’s bed to remind him who won — Ricky got second place) and surfed in the 1965 Duke Kahanamoku Invitational, Peter wasn’t much for contests or so-called “pro surfing.” Peter was rather occupied with a happy, healthy family; a beautiful home on the beach; painting and artistic hobbies; and a career. Surfing was icing on the cake. Aware of his good fortune and the wise choices he made, Peter practiced what he preached in terms of having a certain coherence within a diversity of interests in life that kept him engaged and enriched — family, education, career, and community service — with the essential ingredients of sustaining stoke.

Those of my generation who dedicated all their time to surfing aren’t in the

            lineup anymore. For a surfer to ride into old age, it’s important that surfing be

            nothing more than a recreational activity. It should never be a person’s entire

            life. You should have something [other than surfing] that motivates you in your

brain . . . I think education is important [in order] to have an outlet besides

surfing. And when you get worse, accept it; whereas a lot of guys get worse, they

quit. So, I think having of having a Triple Life — you have family, something that

motivates you, and you have surfing as recreation — will allow you to do it a lot

longer.

I took note, to be sure, especially when it came to balancing a full-on commitment to surfing Sunset Beach with the myriad challenges of education, family, and work. He set an example that effectively laid a blueprint or template for my own life. As I navigated a path, Peter subtly encouraged me to return to graduate school after I finished college, as well as supporting me in making the decision to start teaching at Kahuku High School, Sunset Beach Elementary School (which he established in the early 1970s), and Ka’a’awa Elementary School (where I substituted in his wife, Sally’s, class).

Like the big blue waves on the outside reefs that seemed so remote and foreboding at first, Peter showed by example what was not only possible, but achievable and within reach — which is more than half the challenge. Once one knows it can be done, that it can be grasped, getting there isn’t half so hard, whether it be surfing, education, family, or work. I felt assured of confidence and ease in negotiating the veritable minefields of my 20s in no small part due to Peter’s sage guidance and encouragement. The limits of possibility expanded for me.

Peter simply demonstrated that one could have it all, in a manner of speaking: surf every day, an interesting job, thriving family, self-respect, health, and happiness. Not to mention being an admired leader in the community, protecting the recreational, residential integrity of life on the North Shore. Aristotle calls it Eudaimonia, which is often translated as “human flourishing,” but which can be more precisely expressed in terms of “an activity of the soul in accordance with virtue.” A Hawaiian woman I know and respect from Makaha avers: “Peter Cole was Hawaiian in my book. He exemplified the grace and true values that we all were raised to follow.” Pono — Righteous! His life was a work of art.

We surfed Sunset and Waimea together for years. Both the first time I stroked out to Sunset and The Bay, Peter was there sitting on the outside waiting for a set wave. It seemed perfectly natural while it was happening, although I realize now in retrospect how wildly fortunate I was to share the lineup and learn intimately from one of the true pioneers — along with the likes of Ricky Grigg, Dick Brewer, Flippy Hoffman, Felipe Pomar, Jim Blattau, Jim Soutar, Jimmy Blears, Butch Ukauka, Owl Chapman, Roger Erickson, Jack Reeves, Bill Sickler, Randy Rarick, James Jones, and many others who represent the pantheon of surfing greats who, each and all, loved and admired Peter above all others. He was our favorite and remains so.

Once asked about “the best day ever” at Sunset Beach, Peter recalled a pristine fall day in October — “October 4 to be exact” — in 1976. Long before surf forecasts, Peter was the man when it came to predicting swells, for he had intimate knowledge of the science of meteorology and the source, such as the fabled “Kamchatka Low.”

It was a freak swell from a storm way up there, almost into Russia, with very

            high winds. It had perfect direction, a North-Northwest, with long lines and

            solid 15’ waves. Kimo [Hollinger] was watching Outside Backyards and decided

            to paddle over there, so Eddie [Aikau] and I joined him. We were so far out,

            we could see Turtle Bay to the North. I got a wave from Backyards all the way

            through the channel. Never slowed down! You know, I’ve never had a wave

            even close to equaling that . . . I was high for two weeks! That’s the thing about

            Sunset. Just one good wave, and the drudgery of life doesn’t seem so bad.

There’s a fuzzy old photo I took over 30 years ago (circa 1989) with the Olympus OM-1 my father gave me when I graduated from high school. This photo captures the essence of what Paumalu represents to me then and now: Sunset Beach, Tower #25, in all its subtle, nuanced glory. Left to Right are James “Booby” Jones (Peter’s former student at Punahou — one of the greatest big-wave riders of all time) and Flippy Hoffman on the sand (with Flippy filling Booby’s ear with something sardonic), Peter Cole on the tower stairs, those big hands gently grasping the rail, speaking casually with lifeguards Darrick Doerner and Jimmy Blears (another former student from Punahou and 1972 World Champion surfer) seated on the stairs . . . . Owl standing next to me, his elbow in my ribs, out of the frame . . .

Peter and Flippy were the true pioneers of it all — among the first “Coast Haoles” to see, ride, and conquer the wild surf of the North Shore in the ‘50s, settle there to put down roots, build homes, and raise families. Blears and Booby were Kama’aina locals from Town, among the most outstanding surfers of their generation if not all time. And “Double D” (Darrick) was a certified badass, the best at The Bay at the time (this was before the Tow Revolution, which he spearheaded with Laird) and one of the leashless Masters of Paumalu. But Peter was the Patriarch, the unquestioned leader, voice of reason and authority amidst the cacophony. These were the GODS of the North Shore.

It was just another day and I was just a kid on the sidelines learning the ropes — from the finest. I observed, listened, and learned plenty from these Old Salts, most especially Peter. For a moment, it seemed like it would always be this way. Yet, time and experience taught me otherwise. It’s a bittersweet existential lesson. Everything, everyone fades away sooner or later. Time destroys it all. The tide rises and falls. So, too, the sun. “We all start out as kooks; and we all end up kooks.” Full circle. Today, I regret to admit that the lineup at Paumalu is devoid of the depth and breadth of character and talent that used to populate her waters. I doubt that there will ever again be such men; but I can still see their faces, hear their voices, feel their Mana.

So it goes. As Jerry Garcia said in regard to loss and transition: “Don’t be sad it’s over, be glad it happened.” Aloha ‘Oe, Peter! See you on the Outside Peak on the Other Side. Mahalo Nui Loa!

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu 2022

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Cf. Joe Quigg, Bob Simmons, and the advent of modern surfboard design at Malibu, SEE:

Eternal Return

Aloha O'e Joe Quigg

Joe and his wife: Aggie (née Bane) Joe Quigg died yesterday in Honolulu. It was a curious coincidence, too, in that just yesterday I was talking to a young woman out at Sunset Point (waves were really good: 3’-4’+ and reeling from the Boneyard all the way to Vals and beyond…

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5 years ago · 5 likes · 6 comments · Andy St. Onge

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SEE Photo below listing “World Surfing Greats” by region (“Northern” & “Southern California”) in O. B. Patterson’s 1960 classic, “Surf-Riding: It’s Thrills And Techniques.” Peter and Corny are identified; as are Joe Quigg, Jim Blattau, Ricky “Gregg,” Bob Simmons, “Buzzie” Trent, Bob Shepard . . and others: Phil Edwards, Dale Velzy, Bing Copeland, and a mysterious “Mickey Shapen” (aka: Miki Chapin / Miki Dora).

4

As a math teacher, Peter said he came up with a formula for determining the accuracy of Van Dyke’s tall surfing tales: “add up everything he said, divide by two and subtract one.” Fred teased Peter in return with the assertion that one couldn’t trust Peter’s tales either because he was half-blind, so the waves always looked half their size.

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Craig “Owl” Chapman has probably ridden more set waves at Waimea Bay than anyone in history. Here’s Owl and I at the Bay during the epic El Niño winter season 1997-98. That season was truly historic and marks the highwater mark (pun intended) for my generation, the biggest, best, most consistent winter of surf since the storied winter of 1969 (the year I was born). To this day, almost 25 years later, I haven’t seen another season of big, perfect surf like it. Nothing in memory, observation, or experience compares or even comes close.

This session at big, beautiful Waimea Bay was in February (I think) and at this point there had been so many giant clean days it was mind boggling. I felt very familiar, often comfortable and playful, in huge waves of serious consequence after all these endless swells. And my board (the Panther — an 11’7” three stringer single fin pintail1) that Owl shaped me the summer before simply enhanced my confidence and ability.

Owl was in his late 40s and although not in his prime, he could still ride the best, biggest swells with style and flare, as this photo attests. I clearly remember this set wave coming toward us and standing tall, we just swung, put our heads down, pulled hard, and went together without a word. As we came over the ledge, I also remember thinking that Owl (on his classic 12’ Brewer Gun) was “cutting the corner” a bit — he had always admonished me: “don’t cut the corner!” — while I ran it straight into the trough (the hole). I guess he was giving me a little room.

As we made the transition into the flats at full hull speed (easy 45 mph or more), Owl punched it hard and threw an absolutely beautiful bottom turn (notice the “S-turn” track), showering and blinding me with his spray off his 12 feet of rail for an instant or two — and then he shot to the top of this behemoth and kicked out the back of the wave. I’ve learned a lot surfing behind Owl, watching him close. He’s a master.

Whereas I glided across this Big Blue Wave halfway across the Bay, beyond the lifeguard tower, hit a fade all the way back to the beach, and rode through the shore-break up on to the sand . . . It felt pretty good standing there on the sand with my gun watching Waimea lined across the outside in all her glory with 20’ plus waves exploding a half mile out and cauldrons of white-water and rip filling the inside of the Bay.

Owl has this photo (with me cropped out!) hanging in his shaping room to this day. I don’t care that I’m cropped out, it’s kind of a compliment really. We both know the truth. And I’m stoked he’s proud of this shot — he’s ripping! In any case, how many surfers get to ride a 20’ wave together with their shaper, who happens to be one of the greatest big wave surfers of all time? Not many, I’ll tell you that.

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu 2022

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I still have and ride this beautiful gun. Here are a few photos of me with/on The Panther.

Funny true story: Owl shaped it during the summer of 1997 from a 12’2” Clark Foam Brewer plug. It was a lot of work; he probably tooled on that blank for a few weeks and walked several miles of laps around it, mowing and sanding foam to its final, foiled perfection. Master Glasser Jack Reeves laminated it with one of his exquisite “acid splashes” (with the resin tinted with three colors: orange, yellow, and white. It looked like a solar flare) with the small, understated Brewer Lei laminates and a Surfboards Hawaii laminate on the clear deck, near the tail. Once it was finished and awaiting me to retrieve it from Jack’s shop at Paumalu, Owl coveted this board so much that he simply couldn’t resist or restrain himself, so he grabbed my board and took it for himself. Mind you, this isn’t the first or last time Owl has done such a thing (or in this case attempted) before or since. Owl knows a winner/keeper when he sees it. Anyway, I show up in early September to collect my board and pay Jack. I’m all: “Where’s my board?!” Jack: “Owl took it. Now pay me.” Talk about double jeopardy. That stung! So I went to Owl’s place down the road at the Chung’s ahupua’a across from Sunset and there it is — The Panther (Owl and I always named our boards) — standing in the living room with its high ceilings. Apparently, Owl wanted to admire his latest acquisition. He looked at me slyly, kind of testing me, and said: “How you like my new board?” I protested, of course, and pointed out that not only was this my board, but I had paid for it, and, furthermore, my name was on the stringer! Owl prevaricated, as usual, and there was a bit of a debate, perhaps a scuffle as I grabbed this cherry gun (he’d already waxed it and ridden it at solid Sunset the day before) and split out the backdoor through the kitchen. Somehow, I managed to hold on to The Panther in the ensuing decades and have ridden more giant, perfect waves at Waimea Bay, Phantoms Outer Reef, Point Surf Makaha (Kepuhi), and giant Paumalu (Second & Third Reef Sunset) than I can count, much less remember. Owl still thinks it’s his board. Maybe it’s ours . . .

My grandmother Meme (a French appellation for grandmother, her actual name was Julia, although everyone called her Judy). This is in Minot at our family beach cottage, “Sunnyside,” that her parents, John and Hannah Healy, acquired after the War when the family moved from the Glades just up the road, where they had raised the family. One of ten extraordinary brothers and sisters, Meme was kind of in the middle, closer to the top, as it were. She was at once strong and a very serious, hardworking, no nonsense woman who got things done (ensuring all those around her did as well) and rather sweet and light-hearted.

She liked to enjoy herself, read, have fun, laugh, and chat with others, but only after having completed her work and chores. I loved her very much and she was like a second mother to me. Meme took care of my brother and me for many years, especially after my parents divorced in 1977 until I came of age sometime in the early 1980s and struck out on my own. It’s both notable and a minor miracle that she never — not once — raised her voice at me, which is amazing given what a rascal and pain in the ass I could be.

Among many other things, Meme taught me the Lord’s Prayer, while on my knees next to the same bed my father slept in as a boy in Haverhill. I think of her every time I recite it, which is virtually every day. She was a great cook and always looked sharp, as this photo attests. Look closely. She’s in her summer uniform, looking like a sailor. The expression on her face is so her (the Healy’s have distinctive faces) and I can see both my father and daughter in that visage.

The last time I saw her, over twenty years ago, was on Martha’s Vineyard. She was like a little girl in an old woman’s body, still playful, so gentle and kind. She held my hand with warm affection and asked: “Who are you?” A warm breeze blew off the marsh that felt and smelled just like Scituate, where she was born and raised and spent every summer. While I often miss her, I also feel that she is close, her spirit and example abide at all times, in all places regardless of the expanse of time.

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu 2022

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird

BY WALLCE STEVENS (1917)1

I

Among twenty snowy mountains,   

The only moving thing   

Was the eye of the blackbird.   

II

I was of three minds,   

Like a tree   

In which there are three blackbirds.   

III

The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds.   

It was a small part of the pantomime.   

IV

A man and a woman   

Are one.   

A man and a woman and a blackbird   

Are one.   

V

I do not know which to prefer,   

The beauty of inflections   

Or the beauty of innuendoes,   

The blackbird whistling   

Or just after.   

VI

Icicles filled the long window   

With barbaric glass.   

The shadow of the blackbird   

Crossed it, to and fro.   

The mood   

Traced in the shadow   

An indecipherable cause.   

VII

O thin men of Haddam,   

Why do you imagine golden birds?   

Do you not see how the blackbird   

Walks around the feet   

Of the women about you?   

VIII

I know noble accents   

And lucid, inescapable rhythms;   

But I know, too,   

That the blackbird is involved   

In what I know.   

IX

When the blackbird flew out of sight,   

It marked the edge   

Of one of many circles.   

X

At the sight of blackbirds   

Flying in a green light,   

Even the bawds of euphony   

Would cry out sharply.   

XI

He rode over Connecticut   

In a glass coach.   

Once, a fear pierced him,   

In that he mistook   

The shadow of his equipage   

For blackbirds.   

XII

The river is moving.   

The blackbird must be flying.   

XIII

It was evening all afternoon.   

It was snowing   

And it was going to snow.   

The blackbird sat   

In the cedar-limbs.

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu 2022

You say it is the good cause that hallows even war? I say to you: it is the good war that hallows every cause.

War and courage have done more great things than love of one’s neighbor. Not your pitying but your bravery has so far saved the unfortunate.

What is good? you ask. To be brave is good. Let the little maidens say: “To be good is to be pretty as well as touching.”

They call you heartless: but your hearts are true, and I love the modesty of your heartiness. You are ashamed of your flood, and others are ashamed of their ebb.

— Thus Spoke Zarathustra (Book One § 10, “On War & Warriors,” Friedrich Nietzsche)

My friend, the historian, journalist, screenwriter, ghostwriter, surfer, Brazilian jiu jitsu blackbelt (from the esteemed Rickson Gracie, no less),1 and all around bon vivant, Peter Maguire has revised and reposted another one of my essays on his Substack “Sour Milk.”2 Peter’s version is somewhat re-arranged and slightly shorter than the original. I enjoyed reading my words on the perspective of another writer, which reminds me that I probably need an editor. I trust that you will enjoy reading his revision. In any case, Peter graciously shared my essay with his readers, some of whom have already responded positively and with profound insight.

A gentilhomme that should probably remain unidentified for now (given his clandestine vocation), had rather interesting things to say about “Dreams.” He knows something about risk and consequence, having lived (and almost died) in combat war zones and elsewhere on the proverbial edge. This is what he wrote yesterday in response after reading Peter’s revision of my “Dreams” essay:

That’s a story I often ponder over and still have trouble finding a happy medium. What interests and fascinates me is what we have inside us (some of us) and it’s the subconscious decision-making process when we take a slight pause and step forward. What goes through your brain in that pause, if broken down would fill volumes of books. But it takes literally 2 or 3 seconds and often ends with a “fuck it”. That fuck it is the risk spectrum. Green on the left red on the right and amber above.

Those that play in the amber zone and go close to the red are the Hunter gatherers. Loners often in the sense that they don’t need to follow the crowd but the same types that have friends with similar mindsets and only stick with a handful; the types you’d call and they’d be there. I’m absolutely positive this mindset is built through evolution and the others, those that only play with a large crowd in the green zone are those that will one day develop into a weaker sub-species of urban dwellers who can’t survive outside of that environment.

Laurence Gonzalez wrote  a fascinating book called: “Deep Survival: Who lives, who dies, and why.”3

There he delves into the brain itself and it’s make up and many examples of “Who lives, who dies, and why” — well worth a read.

Erich Maria Remarque, in his book “All Quiet on the Western Front” wrote something that resonates with me and many I guess that “steps forward after a fuck it” :

“At the sound of the first droning of the shells we rush back, in one part of our being, a thousand years. By the animal instinct that is awakened in us we are led and protected. It is not conscious; it is far quicker, much more sure, less fallible, than consciousness. One cannot explain it. A man is walking along without thought or heed;--suddenly he throws himself down on the ground and a storm of fragments flies harmlessly over him;-yet he cannot remember either to have heard the shell coming or to have thought of flinging himself down. But had he not abandoned himself to the impulse he would now be a heap of mangled flesh. It is this other, this second sight in us, that has thrown us to the ground and saved us, without our knowing how. If it were not so, there would not be one man alive from Flanders to the Vosges.”

I went for a swim once near Kuta beach in Bali, beautiful evening. You get these weird double waves there, I used to love diving through the first and then letting the second take me in almost sat on it. Extremely calming experience. Problem was 1: it was evening and 2: I’d been drinking. I dived through the first wave, came up, went to take a breath of air and second, much larger wave smashed me in the face, sent me straight down to the bottom and span me. Didn’t know what up or down was, it was also dark. When it spat me out (thankfully the rip didn’t drag me away) the hotel guards were on the beach. Screaming at me “sharks now big tigers” - fuck sake. Never trust a “fuck it” after a whiskey.

I’m as intrigued as him by the question or issue of “the subconscious decision-making process when we take a slight pause and step forward.” And he’s quite right that “[w]hat goes through your brain in that pause, if broken down would fill volumes of books.” Some of us are wired differently that others, I suppose. And I know full well that I am (or whatever “the self” is that composes “my” body, mind, & will) merely the result or realization of evolutionary/existential possibility/opportunity confronted with a particular moment in space and time. Call it context. Or chance. Whatever it is has less to do with conscious volition and more to do with an inherited legacy of basic instinct (a multiplicity of drives and affects) that actualizes in an instant. Mere coincidence or Fate? We all serve the whims and fancy of what Nietzsche calls “Lord Chance” or that which Lucretius — in his magnum opus “De Rerum Natura” (The Way Things Are) — named the “Cosmic Swerve.” Although, that’s a matter for another conversation or essay — soon to come I trust. Amor Fati.

Shall we not, like archers who have a mark to aim at, be more likely to hit upon what is right? — Aristotle (“The Nicomachean Ethics” §1094a 22-24)

For now, please review Peter’s revised edit and let me (and him) know what you think. Check out “Sour Milk,” read “Breathe” (which I plan to review in the near future — it’s an excellent book), get outside, breathe deep (always through one’s nose), aim high, and do something challenging and fun. Endeavor and Enjoy, as my father often said to his boys. Aloha!

Sour Milk

Dreams Are Truthful Manifestations: Life, Death, and Despair at Waimea Bay

Note to Reader: Some email accounts may crop this post, due to its large size. If necessary, click on the title to go directly to Sour Milk where you will find this post in its entirety. Introduction by Peter Maguire Recently, there has been a spate of well-written books about surfing in which heroic “I, me, and me” narrators tell long-winded tales of d…

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4 years ago · Peter Maguire

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Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu 2022

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SEE the recently published memoir of Rickson Gracie’s extraordinary life, which Peter co-wrote with his friend and Sensei.

https://www.amazon.com/Breathe-Life-Flow-Rickson-Gracie/dp/0063018950

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Sour Milk

Peter Maguire's analysis of international, diplomatic, and cultural affairs.

By Peter Maguire

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SEE: https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Survival-Who-Lives-Dies/dp/0393353710/ref=sr_1_1?gclid=CjwKCAjwgr6TBhAGEiwA3aVuIfrwsAsc9YxvZoFNSRA9j-mn7iy_LQ4HSbmILlAUr8JlcQeyyG9rMBoCAd8QAvD_BwE&hvadid=241912875720&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=9032807&hvnetw=g&hvqmt=e&hvrand=1946242384256432924&hvtargid=kwd-131569482&hydadcr=24662_10400878&keywords=deep+survival&qid=1651527296&sr=8-1

Most every afternoon I hop on my mountain bike and go for a ride through the mountains that surround the North Shore where I live. It’s a good workout, fun escape, and I’m lucky that I can access a byzantine labyrinth of paths, trails, single-track and jeep roads that wind up, through, and all around the highland interior of Northern Oahu from my doorstep. In the course of a year, I put more miles on my bike than my truck (approximately 3000 miles and over 375,000’ of vertical elevation gain last year; I’m on track to do more or less the same this year). Usually, I ride solo. Since I’m alone, spinning up and away on rides that average anywhere from 8 to 25 miles on any given day, I often listen to podcasts as I grind and flow along the trails by my lonesome.

It’s an efficient and edifying use of time, in that I combine strenuous exercise (that’s oddly relaxing) with the sublime thrill of moving continuously through primeval mountain forests, tracing precipitous ridge-lines, and plunging into dark, abyss-like gulches, all the while thinking and learning something along the way. Thus, I thought I’d share some of my favorite podcasts that I listen to with my readers as a spur to both getting outside and after it — thereby strengthening the body — whilst feeding the mind.

Among my daily go-to’s is Mindscape,1 hosted by theoretical physicist and astrophysics professor now at CalTech (and the Santa Fe Institute, formerly of Harvard and elsewhere) Sean Carroll. Carroll is a leading authority on cosmology, field theory, and gravitation. He digs deep into topics such as dark matter and dark energy, modified gravity, topological defects, extra dimensions, and violations of fundamental symmetries, in addition to more foundational questions, both in quantum mechanics (origin of probability, emergence of space and time) and statistical mechanics (entropy and the arrow of time, emergence and causation, dynamics of complexity). Overall, he brings a philosophical dimension to his conversations and makes otherwise formidable topics of inquiry accessible and fun.

A recent episode regarding the implications of the so-called “multiverse” was particularly provocative, in which he discusses a new movie, Everything Everywhere All At Once, with its directors: The Daniels (the collective moniker for writer/directors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert). They talk about philosophy, filmmaking, and how we should all strive to be “kind” amidst the chaos.2

Another thought-provoking podcast with a decidedly philosophical bent is The Partially Examined Life (a.k.a. PEL), hosted by “some guys who were at one point set on doing philosophy for a living but then thought better of it.”3 In each episode, they choose a text to read or review and chat about it with a balance of perspectives that range between penetrating, informed insight and humorous flippancy. One doesn’t have to know any philosophy, or even to have read the text they’re discussing to follow and enjoy the conversation, which I typically do. One of my favorites regards a seminal text in sociology (which I read as an ungraduate): Pierre Bourdieu’s masterwork: “Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste” (1979). In this episode, they explore how tastes (and distinctions) in music, art, food, fashion, and just about everything else reflect one’s social position within the so-called class (or perhaps more properly stated) caste system.4

A spinoff from PEL is Subtext, hosted by Wes Alwen (from PEL) — a psychoanalyst by training and profession — and Erin O’Luanaigh — a high school English teacher. This is a podcast about “the human condition, and what we can learn about it from the greatest inventions of the human imagination: fiction, film, drama, poetry, essays, and criticism.” I really enjoy it, for it never ceases to teach me something about some of my favorite books, films, plays, and poetry, as well as provoking critical self-awareness and reflection in ways that are deeply edifying and even surprising (Alwen as psychoanalyst reads/sees/teaches things most don’t). Standout episodes include one on the movie “Apocalypse Now” (best movie ever in my book)5; and another regarding the brilliant plays of Anton Chekhov.6

The New Books Network is a terrific collection of podcasts that review (as the title indicates) new books from the leading academic presses both in America and Europe with respect for Science and Technology, Politics and Society, Religion and History, the Arts and Humanities more broadly considered. My tastes tend toward philosophy; and an episode from the New Books in Philosophy & Religion series — re: the book “Wisdom as a Way of Life: Theravāda Buddhism Reimagined,” by Steven Collins (Columbia University Press 2020) — taught me a great deal and afforded insights into both how to learn and how to act.7

On that note, with regard to matters of soul, life, learning, and preparation for death (you know, the basics), I also find myself listening to the soothing, compassionate teachings, reflections, and insights of Baba Ram Dass, the former psychedelic guru and spiritual teacher, who began his career as a psychologist at Harvard in the early 1960s (as the former Dr. Richard Alpert, along with his colleague and compatriot Tim Leary). Alpert became Ram Dass (after a trip to India) and evolved into a genuine Bodhisttva (i.e., a person who is able to reach Nirvana but delays doing so out of compassion in order to save suffering beings). His 1971 book “Be Here Now” is a classic (I have a copy) and his recorded conversations, lectures, Q & A’s, and old talk-radio show broadcasts (from San Francisco) provide much wisdom.

The podcast Here and Now (part of the Be Here Now Network) is the place to go to hear and learn directly from Ram Dass, in addition to the teachings of other notable gurus such as Alan Watts, Jack Kornfield, and many others.8 Just the other evening, as I peddled along the coast in drizzling rain on my way out of the mountains somewhere near Kahuku Point (the northernmost extremity of Oahu), I listened to Ram Dass share his thoughts while answering questions about grief, love, transcendence, and how to bring deep spirituality into everyday life. It was really beautiful.9

What happens is, when the grief runs its natural course… you come to the point where you realize that you’ve tasted something with that person that was such a living moment that that moment still exists independent of death. There’s a moment when we recognize that love transcends death. And that has to happen experientially, and it has to happen when grief runs its natural course. – Ram Dass

In Our Time is a British podcast series that is a part of the BBC network and hosted by Melvyn Bragg, an Oxbridge professor, who discusses the history of ideas with his guests on a range of topics drawn from philosophy, science, history, religion, and culture.10 This podcast always teaches me something, most recently affording penetrating insight into the classic ancient Greek tragedy by Sophocles “Antigione,” its relevance and significance for us today.11

The Making Sense podcast hosted by neuroscientist Sam Harris is worth listening to, as well, for Harris “makes sense” as he engages and grapples with most of the timely issues and controversies confronting contemporary civilization in ways at once sober, balanced, and provocative with some of the leading minds of our time.12 A recent conversation with Eric Schmidt (former CEO of Google and Computer Scientist par excellence) is illustrative of Harris’ esoteric approach, in this case the future implications — and applications — of AI (artificial intelligence).13

Another two go-tos for me are Entitled Opinions,14 hosted by Stanford Professor Robert Harrison; and WTF, hosted by the comedian Marc Maron. Entitled Opinions is studious yet also light-hearted and informative, Harrison is a professor of Romance Languages, a musician, and a philosopher. His discussions are lively and fun. One that stands out in memory, with Andrea Nightengale, regards “The Great American Novel,” Melville’s “Moby Dick.” One of the things that stands out in memory from that conversation was how “perfect each and every sentence” Melville wrote in his masterpiece appears. One can (as I have) open to any page or paragraph in “Moby Dick” and find one perfect sentence after another — it reads and sounds like poetry.15

Marc Maron kind of irritates me to tell the truth. He is this trendy, “happening,” rather self-absorbed celebrity that obviously thinks he’s something/someone special; and has some rather kooky, frivolous opinions. Yet he can also be very funny, critically-reflective, and is a good, oftentimes excellent interviewer. It’s the people he talks with that I’m interested in — not Maron. If I remember correctly, Maron was (and remains) at the vanguard of the podcasting phenomenon, as he was one of (if not actually The First) to start what’s become more than ubiquitous — literally everyone has a podcast these days.

In any event, a recent interview with Robert Eggers, the director of some truly great films such as “The Witch” (2015) and “The Lighthouse” (2019) — both tremendously entertaining movies — and a recently released Viking epic, “The Northman” (2022), was more than interesting, it was profound. Eggers is perhaps a “genius” (Maron thinks so) in a time where/when there are few to be found.

Finally, I also enjoy the Broken Record podcast, which focuses specifically on music, the people who create it, and the stories surrounding some of the leading lights in rock and roll present and past.16 Most episodes (that I’ve listened to) are hosted by Über producer and cofounder of Def Jam Recordings Rick Rubin, who has worked closely with everyone in the industry from Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr to Public Enemy and Run-DMC, Johnny Cash, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, the Beastie Boys, and many, many more.

A recent, fascinating conversation with longtime collaborator Chad “I eat drums for breakfast” Smith (drummer from Red Hot Chili Peppers) covered a lot of ground over several decades of musical evolution. Ostensibly about RHCP’s most recent album (“Unlimited Love” — that Rubin produced), their discussion ranged over the history of drumming (literally everyone one could name or imagine: Ringo to Charlie Watts, Ginger Baker to John “Bonzo” Bonham and Keith Moon, et al.) to illuminating reflections on drugs, friendship, and parenting. Check it out.17

That’s all for now, more than enough to consider and contemplate. So, hop on a bike, go for a ride, a walk, run or hike, and tune in to something that teaches you something. Live and Learn. Aloha!

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu 2022

On June 10, 1963, President Kennedy reflected:

So let us not be blind to our differences, but let us also direct attention to our common interests and the means by which those differences can be resolved. And if we cannot end now our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity. For in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's futures. And we are all mortal.1

Not a hundred years before (in 1885), Friedrich Nietzsche proclaimed, in his magnum opus “Thus Spoke Zarathustra,” a certain pedagogy (teaching) phrased in distinctly ecological terms2:

When Zarathustra came to the nearest town, which lay on the edge of the forest, he found there a crowd of people gathered in the market-square, for it had been announced that a rope-dancer would be appearing.[i] And Zarathustra spoke thus to the people:

I teach to you the Übermensch.[ii] The human is something that shall be overcome. What have you done to overcome it?

All beings so far have created something beyond themselves: and you want to be the ebb of this great tide and even go back to the beasts rather than overcome the human?

What is the ape for the human being? A laughing-stock or a painful cause for shame. And the human being shall be just that for the Übermensch: a laughing-stock or a painful cause for shame.[iii]

You have made your way from worm to human, and much in you is still worm. Once you were apes, and even now the human being is still more of an ape than any ape is.

Whoever is the wisest among you is still no more than a discord and hybrid between plant and specter. But do I bid you become specters or plants?

Behold, I teach to you the Übermensch!

The Übermensch is the sense of the earth.[iv] May your will say: Let the Übermensch be the sense of the earth!

I beseech you, my brothers, stay true to the earth and do not believe those who talk of over-earthly hopes! Poison-mixers are they, whether they know it or not.

Despisers of living are they, moribund and poisoned themselves, of whom the earth is weary: so let them be gone!

Once sacrilege against God was the greatest sacrilege, but God died, and with Him these sacrilegious ones too. Sacrilege against the earth is now the most terrible thing, and to revere the entrails of the unfathomable more than the sense of the earth!

Once the soul looked despisingly upon the body, and at that time this despising was the highest thing: she wanted the body to be lean, ghastly, and starved. Thus she thought to slip away from the body and the earth.

Oh this soul was herself still lean, ghastly, and starved: and cruelty was the lust of this soul!

But you too, my brothers, tell me: what does your body proclaim about your soul? Is your soul not poverty and filth and wretched contentment?

Verily, a polluted stream is the human being. One must be a veritable sea to absorb such a polluted stream without becoming unclean.

Behold, I teach to you the Übermensch: he is this sea, in him can your great despising submerge itself.

What is the greatest thing you could experience? It is the hour of the great despising. The hour in which even your happiness disgusts you and likewise your reason and your virtue.

Malama Honua! Aloha! Happy Earth Day 2022!

Pau

Huelo Hale, Paumalu 2022

[i]       “rope-dancer”: Seiltänzer — “rope-dancer” is more literal than the more idiomatic “tightrope-walker” because of the importance of the dance (Tanz) as Zarathustra’s preferred modus vivendi. The “rope-dancer” echoes the holy man’s saying that Zarathustra walks “like a dancer,” and suggests that this figure may also reflect an aspect of Zarathustra himself, as well as being a prototype of the one who goes over (and under) to the Übermensch.

[ii]      In view of the difficulty of finding a satisfactory translation of Übermensch, and since the term has by now become an English word, the term is left untranslated. The most literal translation is “overhuman,” which sounds too barbaric. The reason to prefer that, or “overman” (Kaufmann’s choice), to “superman” (Hollingdale) is the term’s initial association with “overcoming” (überwinden) and “going over/across” (übergehen). In the text as a whole, the over/across connotations outweigh the sense of “over/above” that is also connoted by the German über—but which would also be caught by the English “over.” One should also note the appearance of the natural elements of earth, water, and fire in what Zarathustra says after each of the three pronouncements, “Behold, I teach to you the Übermensch!”: he calls it “the sense of the earth,” “this sea,” and “this lightning.”

[iii]     The allusion here may be, rather than to Darwin, to a passage in the dialogue attributed to Plato, Hippias Major (289a-b): “the saying of Heraclitus that ‘the most beautiful of apes is ugly in comparison with the race of humans’ … [does it not mean that] the wisest of humans, in comparison with a God, will appear an ape?”

[iv]     “sense”: Sinn, which also means “meaning.” But since die Sinne are “the senses,” it is preferable to bring out this association between the earth (nature) and the body. It is interesting to note that an earlier mention of the word Übermensch occurs at the beginning of Goethe’s Faust, in a speech to Faust by “the spirit of the earth” (der Geist der Erde: Faust I: 461, 490).

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SEE:

Eternal Return

Do Not Pray For Easy Lives

Do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men . . . Truth is a tyrant — the only tyrant to whom we can give our allegiance. The service of truth is a matter of heroism. - JFK The fullness of life is in the hazards of life . . . To the heroic, desperate odds fling a challenge…

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5 years ago · 4 likes · 1 comment · Andy St. Onge

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In both my doctoral dissertation (2005) and book (2011), entitled “The Untimely Educator: An Interpretation of Nietzsche’s Philosophy of Education,” I argue that, given the concern he shows for natural relations of dynamic interdependence and holism as they pertain to a healthy and flourishing view of and to life, Nietzsche’s philosophy and political education are essentially ecological. The goal here (for Nietzsche) is the institution of a new, post-humanist and otherwise environmentally-responsible cultural order grounded in a “re-naturalized” ethics.

Moreover, based as it is on the will to power ontology, Nietzsche’s attempt in education to politically reconstitute culture fits with a conception of a regime centrally — and soley — concerned with the cultivation and practice of virtue that “remains true to the earth.” The leading norm for a such a culture, Nietzsche’s new teaching on virtue, would therefore necessarily reflect the needs of a naturalized caste of human beings, the “philosophers of the future” and Übermenschen whose “higher spirits and their tasks,” in Nietzsche’s words, “complements nature.”

With a view to Nietzsche’s writings and teachings, I show by argument and evidence that modern politics and morality are responsible — directly and indirectly — for the destruction of nature, the dissolution of “high culture,” and the “degeneration of the species.” Precisely because these decadent, essentially nihilistic political and morality are no longer vital or functional, they must, according to Nietzsche’s pedagogical enterprise, be replaced with a new, Earth-redeeming politics crowned by a new, Earth-redeeming nobility. Both confronting the crisis in morality, politics, and society and affirming the interdependence of all living things — specifically including humans — with nature, Nietzsche promotes the idea that humankind can no longer afford to abuse the earth.

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[1] Cf. BGE § 218.