Honey, you're never too old to start surfing!
By Nicole Rappell (Byron Bay Surfing Mums)
I have the advantage of living very close to some of the world's most beautiful surf beaches and of having a lifestyle that now supports quite a lot of surfing. Even my son who is less than three can jump into a wide stance on my mal and cruise on tiny waves. But it hasn't always been this way. This is my story of a convoluted pathway to becoming a 'surfing mum'. For those of you who fell in to surfing from a young age, this tale might have little relevance. However for those of you like me who yearned to be a surfer but thought I just didn't have what it took, it may help you to get off the sand and on to a board.
Surfing has enthralled me for a very long time….from a distance! I had read illicit copies of Puberty Blues, at the beginning of high school. I knew what surfing blokes were like and they sacred me! I didn’t live near the beach, have beachy parent’s or friend’s who surfed. Our 1 ½ hour treks across Sydney to the Eastern suburb beaches, as teenagers, resulted in all day sunbathing sessions, the likes of which would horrify us today. The sweaty gathering on towels was occasionally broken by the need to dip in the water. Friends were great body surfers but I was hopeless….too afraid of the big waves. I was gutted when one of my first ex-boyfriends hooked up with a chick who could surf and that was about twenty years ago! As a mature aged student at Uni in London, I was determined to join the Surfing Club. I stayed back late, finally found the room where the club was having it’s first meeting of the year and can remember clearly walking towards the door. Suddenly the sounds of raucous male laughter rolled out. I turned on my heals and walked away….I wasn’t one of them, I wasn’t the type to surf! And so it went on for years. A dream unfulfilled and a bag full of excuses that was weighing me down.
Change comes from strange origins and pathways in long journeys are frequently not straight. After I qualified as a Speech Pathologist I worked just outside London with young adults with disabilities. If anyone could make you pull your finger out to live your life more to the full, then my students could. On one holiday in Devon a friend who had Cerebral Palsy was gagging to get into the surf to body board but could only do it with the assistance of a strong, male relative. Here I was eyeing the surfers from the point and doing nothing when I was more than capable of getting in the water alone. That did it, I bought a steamer and an ex-rental body board. I was hooked. Each Summer I would head to Cornwall with my paraphernalia and body board after my morning Ashtanga yoga session. It was through yoga that I met a sensational young surfing family. One afternoon the dad of the family took me out for a paddle on their gargantuan tandem board. I can still recall the rush to this day, as he hauled me up to standing by grabbing the bum of my wetsuit. It was my first wave on a surfboard and I was…well…in love! They had spent a long time in Byron Bay. So there is was….I began a plan to return home to Australia after 11 years of living in the U. K.
You may think that is the happy end but no joke, this is a seriously convoluted tale. I began to buy ‘surfer chick’ clothes, drooled over issues of The Surfers Path magazine and even changed my e-mail address to include a reference to surfing…..but I still wasn’t a surfer. Finally I arrived in Byron Bay, got a job at one of the hostels and took a few group lessons. All the boys I knew through the hostel surfed boards the size of credit cards and to them a 7 foot board was enormous. My first board was a 7’1” mini mal. I struggled - firstly because I had no transport and secondly because I was 35 and had the balance of Humpty Dumpty. Eventually, one day I was sitting on the beach at The Pass, the waves too fat or small for my ability or board….once again watching others surf (on long boards) and dreaming of being one of them. This time, unlike so many others though, I felt like a surfer and acted like one. I went straight into town, went to three different shops, tried some boards and bought a mal. At last the surfer in me was born and I haven’t looked back.
That was when I was single and could surf before and after work! But as luck would have it, in Byron Bay I found my surfing mojo and my man. My surfing ‘grrrh’ (the thing that makes you really try hard to get onto a wave and do it a little better than last time) was severely shredded by pregnancy and having two little ones just when I was emerging from the real beginners phase. I have never been quite sure if this wasn’t largely due to the eradication of my abdominal muscles and therefore my ‘pop up’ immediately post-baby! During my first period of maternity leave I thought of all kinds of ways to try to find a committed mum to share a surf/childcare with…ads on noticeboards, in the local paper etc but failed to act on any in my bleary new motherhood state. Fortunately for me Byron Bay now has an innovative new group to support surfing mums. Now I can hook up with another like minded mum and catch a few waves whilst sharing childcare. To non-parents this may seem simple and unimportant. To those of us who have struggled to the beach pushing a pram, carrying a mal and all the stuff kids need to stay entertained, you will know that this is synonymous with ‘God I need a surf!’. I am now definitely in the ‘committed improver’ category, eternally grateful that I haven’t had to give up such a wonderful sport in order to have a family and work.
So heres the thing, for any of you who are watching more than doing, there are no ‘surfer types’. Surfing is one of the very few sports that allows you to be just about anything you want to be. My surfing is still pretty poor. I frequently think of my surfing when I hear my favourite line in Toy Story, when Woody insists to Buzz “That’s not flying. That’s falling with style!“. I could easily be out surfed by a 4 year old grommie or for that matter a one legged dog on an esky lid. But that’s not the point. The point is that I love surfing the only way I know how at the moment. So when you’ve had a pretty hard time, having not caught too many waves, and the guys intimidate you when you get out with a cheerfully meant question like ‘So did you get many waves?’ just change the words in your head to ‘Did you have a good time?’. Remember that sitting out the back, waiting for waves, watching the dolphins, chatting to surfing mates and looking back in at the beach is a completely different perspective from when you used to hang close to your towel and take a quick dip. In time you will improve and your arms wont feel like limp spaghetti floundering about when you paddle out. Let your surfer be born and don’t forget, that if you have never surfed before, try a big board. In some situations in life you may think size doesn’t matter…its what you do with it. This is one case where I reckon it does!
You can do it too! Start your own www.surfingmums.com group in your area and you will create a network of friends that will make sure you get in the surf.
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