Read Online Raising A Soul Surfer by Rick Bundschuh, Cheri Hamilton - Free Book Online
Authors: Rick Bundschuh, Cheri Hamilton
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plansfor the future—being a P.E. coach, my art, all of my other sports. All I could think of was surfing and how I could go out again.
Debbie and I pooled our savings and bought a yellow Gordon and Smith longboard for $30. Not too long after, we each had our own surfboard and were paddling out into the lineup at Law Street in Pacific Beach. We learned to surf by trial and error. Our first big error was trying to surf after covering our bodies with baby oil, which was the tanning rage of the day. It took us a few embarrassing days of constantly slipping off of our boards before the light went on! We became part of a small minority of avid surfer girls in a male-dominated world.
Debbie and I soon had surf knots on our knees and the tops of our feet. We rode 9-foot-6-inch, 30-pound long boards, or tankers, as they were nicknamed. They were heavy, which is probably the main reason most girls did not take up surfing. At first, we would both carry a surfboard to the water; but soon the guy surfers at Law Street would always insist on helping us out and even waxing them for us with the standard paraffin wax. Everyone always shared wax back then, as it was cheap!
We hung out with the same group of guys at the beach all summer long. Most of them were excellent surfers who only really cared about riding the waves. We always saw Skip Fry and enjoyed watching his amazing style. Not every girl could handle it. In the late sixties, surfboards were still big and heavy. Leashes hadn’t even been invented yet; so if you wiped out, it meant a long swim in chilly water to get your board back. Wetsuits made specifically for surfing were in their infancy and were largely ineffective. While conditions were nothing like what Tom was experiencing back in New Jersey, a cold February morning in the kelp-filled Pacific could turn you blue and numb in a hurry. It made sense that most people considered surfing to be a sport only for tough, hardy males. Someone forgotto tell my sister and me. Even if they had, we would have paddled back out for more.
We improved our surfing pretty fast, but Debbie was always the best. She could switch stance so naturally and had the most amazingly smooth style going for the biggest of the set waves! We had fun paddling out on our knees and would stand up when going over an unbroken wave. Otherwise, it was a workout to plow through the wave with a push up when trying to get out past the breaking surf.
We didn’t have leashes back in the 1960s, so we had to keep our guard up and not get hit by a flying board after someone wiped out. I began to surf well by most standards for women, and I won several contests back then, but I always felt second because of my sister’s incredible talent.
One day, my parents would not let us bring our surfboards to the beach because the surf was supposed to get really big. We were so upset when we got to the beach, because the surf was perfect, with nice shoulder-high waves just like we liked it.
Once in a while, our family would go to Ocean Beach, and we would surf by the jetties, but my parents preferred to go to La Jolla Cove. They would drop us off at Law Street to surf because it was on the way to their beach. An unusual coincidence was that two other girls, named Debbie and Shary Melville, the same ages as we were, surfed the same break! Later in life, I found out that Debbie Melville got married on the same day as Tom and I did. Not to mention that my co-author, Rick Bundschuh, surfed Law Street at the same time and was best friends with my boyfriend!
After my older sister got her driver’s license, we could get to the beach on our own. We borrowed my mom’s car and started surfing Sunset Cliffs regularly. We liked the reefs, as it was an easier paddle out through a channel, not having to punch through closed-out sets at the beach breaks.
We damaged Mom’s car several times and busted out the oil pan going over the bumpy dirt road at the end of Sunset Cliffs. Then we
Debbie and I pooled our savings and bought a yellow Gordon and Smith longboard for $30. Not too long after, we each had our own surfboard and were paddling out into the lineup at Law Street in Pacific Beach. We learned to surf by trial and error. Our first big error was trying to surf after covering our bodies with baby oil, which was the tanning rage of the day. It took us a few embarrassing days of constantly slipping off of our boards before the light went on! We became part of a small minority of avid surfer girls in a male-dominated world.
Debbie and I soon had surf knots on our knees and the tops of our feet. We rode 9-foot-6-inch, 30-pound long boards, or tankers, as they were nicknamed. They were heavy, which is probably the main reason most girls did not take up surfing. At first, we would both carry a surfboard to the water; but soon the guy surfers at Law Street would always insist on helping us out and even waxing them for us with the standard paraffin wax. Everyone always shared wax back then, as it was cheap!
We hung out with the same group of guys at the beach all summer long. Most of them were excellent surfers who only really cared about riding the waves. We always saw Skip Fry and enjoyed watching his amazing style. Not every girl could handle it. In the late sixties, surfboards were still big and heavy. Leashes hadn’t even been invented yet; so if you wiped out, it meant a long swim in chilly water to get your board back. Wetsuits made specifically for surfing were in their infancy and were largely ineffective. While conditions were nothing like what Tom was experiencing back in New Jersey, a cold February morning in the kelp-filled Pacific could turn you blue and numb in a hurry. It made sense that most people considered surfing to be a sport only for tough, hardy males. Someone forgotto tell my sister and me. Even if they had, we would have paddled back out for more.
We improved our surfing pretty fast, but Debbie was always the best. She could switch stance so naturally and had the most amazingly smooth style going for the biggest of the set waves! We had fun paddling out on our knees and would stand up when going over an unbroken wave. Otherwise, it was a workout to plow through the wave with a push up when trying to get out past the breaking surf.
We didn’t have leashes back in the 1960s, so we had to keep our guard up and not get hit by a flying board after someone wiped out. I began to surf well by most standards for women, and I won several contests back then, but I always felt second because of my sister’s incredible talent.
One day, my parents would not let us bring our surfboards to the beach because the surf was supposed to get really big. We were so upset when we got to the beach, because the surf was perfect, with nice shoulder-high waves just like we liked it.
Once in a while, our family would go to Ocean Beach, and we would surf by the jetties, but my parents preferred to go to La Jolla Cove. They would drop us off at Law Street to surf because it was on the way to their beach. An unusual coincidence was that two other girls, named Debbie and Shary Melville, the same ages as we were, surfed the same break! Later in life, I found out that Debbie Melville got married on the same day as Tom and I did. Not to mention that my co-author, Rick Bundschuh, surfed Law Street at the same time and was best friends with my boyfriend!
After my older sister got her driver’s license, we could get to the beach on our own. We borrowed my mom’s car and started surfing Sunset Cliffs regularly. We liked the reefs, as it was an easier paddle out through a channel, not having to punch through closed-out sets at the beach breaks.
We damaged Mom’s car several times and busted out the oil pan going over the bumpy dirt road at the end of Sunset Cliffs. Then we
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