The Only Thing To Do On Vacation Is Hobble (or) Notes On A Montauk Family Surf Excursion Vol. 3

For years I didn't drink coffee. Like alcohol, cigarettes and truly good cheese, much of my abstinence stemmed from the youthfully undeveloped tastes my brain wasn't able to place (A). But soon, as I grew older and came to embrace all these elemental vices coffee remained a nemesis (B).

I used to crow about my non-addictive personality. I've survived relatively hard drug use with uncommon ease, quit cigarettes multiple times cold turkey and never had a girlfriend longer than three months pre nuptials. I used to think I had a special constitution that just couldn't be beat that way.

I now know that to be a false understanding of the situation (C).

In fact, it feels like my abstaining ways and my subsequent aggrandizing about them are really just a papier mâché mask I wear over my addiction to feeling like I'm unaddictable; a permanent crutch of untouchability I bumble around on in a vain attempt to fool myself into thinking I'm free (D).

Lately I've been thinking about brain waves (E) and this idea that all these waves can get twisted in their own patterning, pinging about in our skull, creating cross currents, smashing up against each other, canceling each other out, drifting from this to that and becoming unpredictably dominant at the most useless times.

I've been thinking about how it feels after one gets out of the water and how this bliss sorta sets in (F).

I imagine that all these brain waves, muddled and myopic, fighting unknowingly for supremacy and function, might just get massaged in some meaningful way by the longer form, ultimately deeper, more environmental waves that fuel our time on the board. Like the ocean is this big kneading bread roller, evening out the patterns of our brain.

And I wonder if the roots to my aversion to coffee, basically the desire to feel free from the control of some outside stimulant, hasn't affected my relationship with surfing. Am I so afraid of being controlled by someone, something outside me that I'd risk losing it completely?

Maybe I should allow a new era of vulnerability (G).


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 A (Watching kids at Sunday School sneak cups from the metal silos from the tables in the foyer, never being able to stomach the taste no matter how much milk and sugar I poured in.) or (Trolling at the Venetto's coffee shop between Thompson's Drug and the QFC, never quite truly believing seeing the point of the mocha beyond the nitrous oxide canisters used for the whipped cream.) or (Hanging out at late night Denny's smoking cigarettes and letting my mouth get so dry the bland coffee seemed a ridiculous choice over the massive glasses of OJ.)

B (Working the overnight shift at Hot Spots on State Street, self-righteous in my ability to stay awake without the use of the crack everyone else was chugging.)

C (I've been married for 18 years. There's gotta be some kind of addiction going on there. And I've worked at the same sort of job for the last 15 years more or less. There's some autopulverizing acquiescence happening there for sure.)

D (And I'm sure I hope others.)

E (Gamma: associated with the formation of ideas, language and memory processing, and various types of learning) and (Beta: generally the mental state most people are in during the day and most of their waking lives) and (Alpha: when you close your eyes your brain automatically starts producing more alpha waves) and (Theta: light sleep or extreme relaxation) and (Delta: when your dominant brainwave is delta, your body is healing itself and "resetting" its internal clocks.)

F (Return traffic notwithstanding.)

G (Nine years ago on the heels of my first son's birth I bought an espresso machine.)