It was a rare, glassy morning with a rising swell, but it was inconsistent, and crowded.
“When I paddled out there were already 10 guys,” Boogie Pete said with a rare grumpy face as I joined him at 7:30 in Siberia — the shunned but uncrowded Suis rights.
“At least it’s just the two of us here,” I chirped.
He glowered. “We’re getting dragged in over the reef and then a cleanup set’s gonna come and crush us.”
“Let’s move then!”
He relented. “But these little inside waves are so tempting.”
These little snappers produce my worst wipeouts. I moved and waited for the bigger waves that break in deeper water.
As I took off on a nice-size right, Pete was paddling out and I had to stall so as not to hit him. Then I cranked a turn and pushed hard to get through a fast-breaking section.
“Great wave!” shouted a surfer as he paddled out, flashing a shaka sign. My heart sank: It was the surf instructor. He brings groups of students out to the Suis rights, pushing them on waves and urging them on with shouts. Whenever he’s around, I feel inhibited, my timing and confidence thrown off.
I waved reluctantly. “Thanks.”
He paddled out alongside me. “That was an amazing wave! I give it a 9.3. You’re in the league!”
“Just lucky.”
“No, those little cuts you were making in the face really gave you speed!”
A wave approached and he motioned with his chin. I realized he wasn’t going to leave me alone until I caught another.
“Look over your left shoulder!” he shouted as I paddled.
I was getting a free lesson.
I clawed my way onto the wave, making the brief drop under a snappy peak to glide down a tapering wall.
He gave a thumbs-up, and I realized he is a natural teacher: Bossy but ambitious for his students, he loves what he does. I also appreciated his offer of an olive branch. We need diplomacy in the lineup.
“ETHAN WAS out earlier,” Pete remarked once we were alone again.
“Who?”
“The psychologist. The three of us were surfing before the hurricane?”
“Oh, right.” I’d thought Ethan was a college student. “A psychologist, really! Like you.”
“No, a real psychologist,” said Pete, who’s head bartender at a Waikiki hotel. “You’d be surprised at all the occupations we have out here. Saul, there, is a brain surgeon.”
“Not!” I thought he was a slacker, resembling as he does a young Keanu Reeves with his straight black hair and brown skin.
“Billy’s a boatswain on the Golf Ball (Sea-Based X-Band Radar).”
Captain Cal retired early from Matson, and Kimo C. retired early-early from Kamehameha Schools, where Kimo B. also worked before becoming an investment guru.
My surf sisters include Cristal, a Pilates trainer, and Debbie, who teaches K-12 gardening and ecology and, with her children and surfer-oceanographer husband, Kimball, has started an organic farm. Andree teaches art, Professor Pauline teaches history.
“Walter’s a sewage engineer, I think,” Pete went on.
“Ben and John are civil engineers. And there’s dentist dude.”
“Dave is an oral surgeon,” Pete corrected.
There’s also a Hawaiian Airlines pilot, who swoops across the inside waves, and sometimes weatherman Guy Hagi, whose surf reports influence crowds.
Tatt Man man appeared; I enjoy his loud lectures on surf etiquette. The ones who need it most are the “butt surfers,” as the Captain calls the kayakers, the lawyer among whom ran over Eddie and broke his new board in half.
“I’d like to sit at Pauline’s reef,” Peter said of the shallow inside shoulder where she lines up. “But you have to move too quickly to get out of people’s way.”
THE CAPTAIN frequents Pauline’s reef, and recently I wiped out on an inside snapper and skegged him, piercing a bloody puka in his forearm through his rash guard. I apologized and offered to drive him to urgent care.
“Nah,” he said. “I figure I’m only losing a millimeter an hour.”
I knew the Captain was OK when he spun around, caught a wave and paddled back out. Still, I better be more careful — and take a first-aid class.
“In the Lineup” features Hawaii’s oceangoers and their regular hangouts, from the beach to the deep blue sea. Reach Mindy Pennybacker at 529-4772 or mpennybacker@staradvertiser.com.
