Scratching the Horizon

by Izzy Paskowitz

  But even with what was going on with Isaiah, even with Danielle’s struggles to hold it together at home, I wanted it to be my turn again; I wanted my sun to keep shining. I loved the juice of competition too, too much to give it up. It made no sense, but I kept at it. I knew I needed to find a way to make real, consistent money; I knew I needed to be present, and to start finding some points of connection with Isaiah, while somehow blocking out time to form meaningful relationships with Elah and Eli, too. In my bones, I knew all of these things … and yet … and yet … my comeback was always just around the corner. I’d been a rock star surfer, no shit, no lie; it was all I knew, so I thought I could be a rock star surfer again. Or still. Whatever. I’d put it out there to Danielle that I was feeling good and strong, and that I owed it to all of us to get back out there and compete. And I’d make such a good and convincing case—to Danielle, to myself—that I’d head out for the next tournament and have at it.

  And it’s not like I wasn’t competitive. It’s not like I didn’t deserve to be on the same wave as all these other longboarders. It’s just that the wave was no longer mine.

  12

  The Second Wave

  I’ve heard one other story like mine. Just one. Lots of surfers, they talk about these giant waves, killer swells that slap the crap out of you and drive you down. They’re like the tall tales you hear from fishermen, when they’re out swapping stories over beers. There’s a macho pride in sizing up these monsters and living to tell about them, but if you surf you can tell the guys with a real story from the guys who are full of shit.

  I was at the butt end of my career, but I was still getting low-end endorsements, still skimming off my per diem and my swag to put a little something in my pockets. I still wore my hair long and died it blue-black, to look like Elvis. Folks on the tour, they knew who I was, the kind of surfer I’d been. They knew my family, my story. And, lately, they knew the turns my story had taken. They knew about Isaiah. They knew I’d been down, hadn’t won a thing in a long, long while, and that I was running from whatever was going on at home. And keep in mind, this was when there was a whole lot going on at home, when Isaiah was getting bigger, and more and more of a handful.

  A part of me couldn’t deal with the thought of having an autistic kid, but a bigger part couldn’t actually deal with this particular autistic kid, and it was in the middle of this swirl of craziness and denial that this one enormous wave knocked me clear to forever, left me thinking I was about to die. And then, just when I thought I might claw back to the surface, gulp back another breath of cool, wet ocean air and live to mess with another day, a second monster came and nearly finished me off.

  That’s the short version.

  Here’s the way I tell it over beers: We were on Réunion Island, a tiny slip in the Indian Ocean, off Madagascar. That’s where they held the world championships in 1996. The idea was to go looking for the best waves on the planet. Never the same beach twice, never the same party, which was how we wound up in such a remote spot; after a while, they ran out of beaches. Some years, like when the event was in Australia, there’d be reporters, parades, crowds.… But on a barren outpost like Réunion Island, there was none of that. Just a bunch of surfers doing our thing, no one to thrill but each other, ourselves.

  What I remember most about this one tournament was the flight—twenty-one hours, not counting a brief stopover in South Africa to refuel. Man, I was dreading that flight. Had all my surfboards packed and ready and I was pacing and jittery and nervous about spending all that time in the air. I don’t usually mind flying, but this was such a killer trip, getting out to this small island in the middle of the Indian Ocean, it messed with my head. It set up the whole tournament like a real grind, where you want to approach one of these events with a healthy, open perspective. That’s the ideal, right?

  Typically, there’s a real feel-good element that attaches to an ASP world championship event. (ASP—as in Association of Surfing Professionals, the sport’s main governing body.) That’s also part of the ideal, part of the deal. You surf as a team, but you’re judged as individuals. You represent your country, and that year I was captain of the U.S. team. It was an honor I no longer deserved, but it wasn’t so long ago I was riding high. The way it works is there’s a separate team from Hawaii, which I always thought was messed up—but, hey, Hawaii is out there on its own and it’s produced so many legendary surfers, it’s like its own country. So there’s this ritual where you get a jar of water from your break back home and bring it with you to the event. It fell to me as captain to take care of it for our group, so I was flying with this jar of water, making sure nothing happened to it. Before the tournament, everybody takes the water and mixes it in a big bowl, and then they do this ceremony that’s meant to symbolize the coming together of all the world’s best surfers. You say a bunch of prayers, and they put these leis around your neck. Leis, rosaries … whatever we could grab to dress up the ritual.

  I walked out into the water with all these other surfers, and it was a real moment. We all took it seriously—like we were making an offering to the surf gods. There’s a lot of superstition among surfers, so everyone was careful to get it right, but at the same time we all knew it was kind of screwy. Still, none of us wanted to be the one to screw it up; we were buying into it and playing along, both. I was carrying this big-ass jar and wearing two beautiful carnation leis around my neck—one white, one red—along with a set of rosaries and a tiny cross that technically belonged to my youngest son, Eli, who was still just a baby. I’d thought to take them along for good luck—and to connect me to whatever was going on back home, whatever it was I was running from, whatever it was I was supposed to be.

  * * *

  I was still sort of hungover from the flight, so there was a whole lot of surreal to the scene. In fact, the flight was so damn long, I was probably hungover twice, and here on the back end of this second drunk I was moving mostly on residual fumes. I looked around at all these other surfers, people I’d known most of my life, all of us dressed for this weird-ass ceremony on the edge of nowhere, taking it seriously but not too, too seriously, getting ready to face down these gruesome waves that looked more likely to swallow us whole than to lay out a carpet for us to ride.

  Oxbow was the sponsor again this year; wasn’t much to sponsor, because there weren’t a whole lot of folks around to notice, but Oxbow had photographers in the water, trying to record the ceremony for their Web site; they were a French clothing company, so they were big into pictures of beautiful people in beautiful settings, and there was plenty of both. Still, half the surfers were half in the bag from the long flight, so it wasn’t much of a photo opportunity. A bunch of us had come out directly from the airport, and we were all thrashed and greasy and smelling like shit. By the end of the flight, one of the toilets on the plane had been stopped up, so the cabin reeked like an outhouse by the time we landed, and now the smell was in our hair, on our clothes, all around.

  Meanwhile, all of this pain-in-the-ass travel stuff was running completely counter to the beautiful scenery. Beautiful, eerie, intimidating as hell … it was all of that, really. Like nothing I’d ever seen, and I’d been all over. Surfed everywhere there was to surf. But I’d never seen a spot like this. If it was a movie, it would feel like some bullshit, computer-generated special effect; you could close your eyes and picture it and still come nowhere close to what was actually unfolding in your view.

  Réunion Island is essentially an atoll, which means it’s mostly coral and it mostly surrounds its own lagoon. For surfers, this can make for some monstrous waves, which I guess is why the ASP folks chose this spot. The water comes at you from all sides, from great distances, and when the deep water hits the shallow reef it creates a vicious current. Actually, “vicious” doesn’t begin to cut it. Réunion Island in particular was a spooky surf spot—breathtaking to look at, but also kind of ominous and treacherous. I was terrified of those waters. Plus, there was a jagged reef, all alon
g the coast, and you could tell from the color that it went from deep to shallow, every here and there, so you’d never know if you were about to be slapped against a floor of coral. I was psyched and terrified, all at once. Oh, I’d go out and ride, but I wasn’t looking forward to it, not like some of these hot-shit younger guys who seemed to be looking forward to it, not like I used to look forward to getting wet on some of these other beaches around the world. Actually, it’s not even accurate to call this spot a beach. More of a sick joke wired to a sick wave machine. Wasn’t any kind of resort to speak of, just a stretch of jagged lava rock. No sand, really. There were only a couple nothing special places to stay, so in some ways I guess you could say it was all about the waves. Wasn’t anything else. Just a bunch of hard-core warrior surfers perched on a volcano, a long fucking way from civilization, our boards the only thing separating us from the heinous surf.

  Okay, so we did our little ceremony, and struck just the right reverent tone, and at the other end there was still a patch of daylight. If you looked out at the water the scene was framed in such a way that the deep blue waves were cresting with all this thick white foam, all of it lit by this fiery orange of the fading sun. Oh, man, it made a pretty picture! But underneath the shot was the dark, dangerous power of those killer waves. Also, it was ridiculously muggy. The kind of muggy that sapped your strength and got you thinking of sucking back a couple more cold ones before calling it a night. A lot of the guys came right back to shore after we did our thing with the leis and the rosaries, thinking to do just that, but a few of us decided to paddle out and catch a couple waves. You know, just grab a taste, acclimate, give ourselves an idea of what to expect the next morning. So I slid my board from its bag, put the fins in, and went to check it out. The rest of my shit was still in the car. I hadn’t even unpacked.

  On the way out, I could see the line of waves stretching into the fat of the horizon. There was wave after wave after wave. Usually, there’s a lull between sets; depending on the strength of the swell, there could be three or four sets, or ten or twelve, and here there was just no letup. Just one wave after the next. No letup, no lull.

  The idea, heading out like this the night before a tournament, is to see where the waves break, where the sets are, where you’ll line up the next morning. Of course, the surf would be completely different by the next morning, but at least you’d have a baseline. You might want to pick out some markers along the shoreline, to triangulate where you are. A palm tree. A house. A bluff jutting out towards the water. Something. Only here there weren’t really any markers, just a long stretch of creepy coastline.

  To my left, I could see a couple lifeguards on Jet Skis. Réunion Island was a French territory, so I figured these guys were probably French and that they wouldn’t be much help. I would have much preferred a couple burly, fearless Hawaiians on patrol, keeping me safe. Still, these French lifeguards were zipping around, keeping a French eye on things, and after a beat or two I turned my attention to the water. I could feel the concussion of the waves, coursing up through my board. The sun had dipped another notch, and it was starting to feel like dusk. The color of the water, which had been a deep, vivid blue, was now more like cobalt, like it was covered in shadow, and it occurred to me I’d have to turn back in soon enough.

  Just then, I saw a serious set approaching. My one and only thought was, Fuck! That’s all. Just, Fuck! I didn’t care about catching it; I just wanted to get over it. I’d reached a spot where the water was suddenly deeper. You could tell from the grading of the saturation. The deep water meant I wouldn’t get slapped onto the reef, but it also meant I could be driven so far down by this thing I’d never fight my way back up.

  At this point, a lot of the guys were getting hit. The height of these things was just impossible to navigate. I made it over one, barely, and then the crash of the wave almost sucked the air out of me. I could feel the ripping wind from the wave, like I was caught in a giant force field, all the air being pulled down, down, down.

  I was above the surface, but for a long moment I couldn’t breathe.

  First time I looked back, I saw a bunch of scattered boards. The other guys were getting annihilated by these waves, and best I could tell nobody had even tried to catch one just yet. If I listened, I could hear a couple of these other surfers screaming, only they were shouts of joy, exhilaration. They were crying, “Woo hoo!” Or, “Yeah!” Or whatever they’d taken to shouting to get their juices going.

  Me, I was flat terrified. I was getting a little too old for this shit. My buddies were all stoked, even though they were getting killed by these sets, and I was in survival mode. That’s all. I just wanted to get through it, past it, over it. I wanted it to be tomorrow. Hadn’t even started yet, and already I’d had enough.

  Next thing I knew, the water at my belly started to roil and feather. I’d come upon the killer wave of all these killer waves, and I struggled against it. Wasn’t any time to think, just react. My mind raced back over the thousands upon thousands of sets I’d seen, in all my years of surfing. A million waves, probably—maybe more. And so, against this endless frame of reference, a lifetime of rescue maneuvers kicked in, and I reached for one of the worst, in this particular scenario. Without really thinking about it, on instinct, I attempted to duck-dive.

  Normally, that’s not a bad strategy, but I was a long way from normally. In a duck-dive, you use your board like a scoop and you kind of stand up against the wave and push the board under and through, but it left me vulnerable in the middle of this mammoth set. What I should have done was rip off my cord and dive under the water, beneath the power of the wave. The duck-dive would have been cool, if I could have pulled it off, and if anybody was looking on at just the right moment and happened to catch it, but as soon as I committed to it I knew it was all wrong. At first, I thought I’d make it through, but then my board popped up just as the colossal wave started to crest, and I was thrown backwards.

  The hit knocked all the air out of me, which made a bad situation worse, because what you want to do just before you go under is suck in one last breath. Then you’re okay. Then you wait out the wave and pop back up, but here I was already out of air when I went down. Or just about. I was in the heart of the impact zone, where the full energy of the wave whiplashes the current, and as I fell over it felt like I was being sent over Niagara Falls. Backwards. With no fucking idea when I’d hit bottom. And then, when I did finally hit, it felt like I’d tumbled two stories onto a slab of concrete.

  My lungs were empty. My eyes were closed, my bones rattled to shit. I started sinking beneath the immense power of the wave, and after another beat I felt myself lifting. I was being slapped around every which way, flipping and tumbling, up and down, over and over. I was like a rag doll. In fact, that’s what they call it, when you’re tossed and turned like that by a giant wave. You’re rag-dolled, and it felt for a long, sick moment like I was in a washing machine, set on full tilt.

  I tried to think. Wasn’t so easy, thinking. At some point, I realized that if I could only reach to the bottom I could push back to the surface. At the spot where the wave hit, it wasn’t so deep—maybe twenty feet. The first problem with this strategy, though, was I couldn’t tell up from down. The second problem: I was still attached to my board, and as I was being rag-dolled by the momentum of the wave the board was being pulled against the current and I was being dragged down by the leash.

  (Oh yeah … the leash. I know I wrote earlier that I tended to avoid the leash in competition, but this was not yet a competition; this was just me, getting a feel for the wave. And these were no ordinary sets, so a leash seemed like a good idea.)

  I couldn’t figure out what the hell was going on. Meanwhile, from the beach, you could see my board kind of tombstoned in the water. That’s another great surfing phrase for when the shit hits the fan—“tombstoning,” which is what your board is doing when it’s straight up and bobbing, half in, half out of the water. It’s not a good sign, when your b
uddies on the beach see that, because it means you’re below the surface, pulling against the board with the strength of the wave.

  Ten seconds passed. Felt like twenty.

  Then, ten seconds more. Felt like forty.

  I started to panic. Big-time. I even started to scream. My mouth was shut, but I unleashed a sick, anguished cry. Didn’t know where it came from, what it meant; it was almost primal. My eyes had been shut, but by now I’d opened them. A lot of good that did me. Still couldn’t see for shit, only now I had to think what this might mean, that I couldn’t see, that the water was so black I couldn’t spot my own hand in front of my face.

  I was deep into survival mode, but I couldn’t do a single thing to save myself. I could only flail about in a blind panic, and start to think I might never see my kids again. Me, who kept ducking out when things got tough. Me, who couldn’t deal with whatever Isaiah was dealing with, what Danielle was dealing with in dealing with him. Me, who half the time couldn’t tell which way was up at home and now couldn’t tell which way was up in the Indian Fucking Ocean.

  In my panic, I began to feel claustrophobic. Like the world was pressing down on me, closing in, choking me. I’d been in some tough spots in the water, but I’d never felt anything like … this.

  I was desperate to breathe. My lungs were ready to burst. I was screaming, certain I was about to die, bumming that I was about to die. (Oh, man, I was bumming!) And yet, somehow, in the middle of all that wild frenzy, I could feel the full force of that killing wave start to fade, and for a thin, small moment I thought the waters would still and I could clamber to the surface. But then, another thin, small moment later, another wave came crashing down to replace the first, and I went from thinking there was a way out and that the worst had passed to thinking I was totally, seismically, completely fucked.

  * * *

  It’s funny, the thoughts that run through your head the moment you realize you’re about to die. People say their whole lives flash in front of them, like a sudden slide show, but that’s not how it was for me. It was more like every relevant thought flashed through my brain, all of them piled on top of each other. I knew right away what that second wave meant. I’d actually talked about it with a surfing buddy of mine named Strider Wasilewski, who’d been through the same deal. His was that one other story I hinted at earlier. We talked about if it was better to black out or swallow. Basically, those are your only two options, when you’re drowning, and as this second wave crashed over me I gave some swift, serious thought to each. I knew I was about to die. I was dead solid certain. Only thing left was to figure how I was about to die, and I tried to remember what Strider had said. For the life of me, I couldn’t remember if he tried to black out or take in water. If he felt like he even had a choice. I wanted to give up, but at the same time I didn’t. I wanted to go unconscious, but I couldn’t think how.