Surfs Up

Obsessed with surfing would be putting it gently.  I have lived near the lake growing up, and I have fond memories of going there during the warmer portions of the summer months when I was very young, and again as an adult taking my own children. There is something about the water that draws me in. You would think that having almost drown as a child I would steer clear of it. I fear the opaque blackness of it's depths and the cold, smooth surface as it surrounds me and swallows me whole. I have only been near the ocean a couple times. Drowning is a nightmare that revisits my mind often, and I have often said that is by far the last way I would ever wish to leave this Earth. I think that is why I am so infatuated by surfing. The ocean is conquered by the common man (or woman). You watch the board slide down the face of the wave as it curls around it and it's rider closing in faster and faster, as though the fist of mother nature herself  wants to crush out life, bit by bit, person by person. As if she is reminding the human race who decides who lives or dies. But not the surfer. The surfer gets crushed over and over but goes back again and again to conquer that wave. To dance on the face of danger. This book is about that life, that obsession, that passion to be more than you thought you ever could. To overcome that which is deemed insurmountable. To make the choice between loving the life you have and letting go of the life you want. That is the kind of story that inspires me.  Happy Summer!!!