Tag Archives: surfing illustrations

“Caught Inside” triptych, in progress

Posted on by under Erwin Dence illustrations, real surfers, surf illustrations, surfing art, surfing drawings, surfing illustrations

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It’s not like I’m looking for a vote, but: I did two versions for the right side of a possible triptych. I did the one on the right first but wasn’t completely stoked, mainly, I must admit, because the woman just didn’t look too attractive. Trish voted (because I asked her to), for the one on the right. This was before I did more work on the middle one, of which Trish said, “She’s prettier, but she doesn’t look happy.” “Oh, but the other one’s not too attractive.” “Either is the guy in the first one.” Well, maybe with some color… check back later. Thanks.

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so, a little color and… I still like the one on the right, but… later on this one.

Secret Spot

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Secret Spot

Secret Spot
Your secret spot exists at the intersection of memory and imagination.
A certain amount of desire, somewhere on the scale between longing and all out obsession, should be included.
So, maybe it’s a confluence, a perfect merging of several streams.
Sure.
You’ve had, like bubbles in an endless sky; a few moments that were only sheer, pure bliss;
Joy, as if you were in that bubble, in some separate reality, some secret Shangra-La;
And though you were, probably, in the midst of some curious blend of peripheral chaos and among others, the motionless, clueless others; those others who missed your moment,
Calmly looking toward some blank horizon,
Waiting for a repeat of their remembered moment of terror and weightlessness;
But you want to repeat your moment…
Another again;
And when you do, that moment will overlay, perfectly,
Merging with and among the collected previous moments you long to,
Really long to… repeat.
And then… you look toward that blank horizon. Waiting, waiting
Again, as another bubble floats by.

You Knew You Couldn’t Capture the Magic or the Madness

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The thing about color, as opposed to black and white scratching, is that, once you start, you’re going to have to figure out where you want to go. The problem with black and white scratching is, well, once you take a wrong line, it’s so hard to pull back.

So, I made a few copies of the black and white, thinking I could just forget the ones where I screwed up; look for that balance; still driving down the line. Lines.

 

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My family, usually with my friend Phillip Harper along, explored several surf spots other than Tamarack in my first years of surfing (1965- ?). I paddled, head-down, ruining unknown numbers of rides for real surfers at Swamis, quickly discerned Moonlight Beach was really not a surfing beach, decided Oceanside Pier was just too rough, and had too many Marines, many new to ocean swimming, getting in the way. Or I was actually afraid I’d get in their way.
Several times we moved on down 101, past Swamis, to where the future San Elijo State Park was under construction. Pipes was named for the then-new (now considerably shorter, rusted) drainage pipes hanging out of the side of the cliff. There were several sets of stairs, and we seemed to start at about the middle of the stretch that ends, to the south, at Cardiff Reef. It all seemed about the same, wave-wise, to me, at that time.
What I do remember is how clear the water seemed to be, protected by offshore kelp, onshore winds reduced by the cliffs, and with a mostly stable rock-infused bottom contour. I swear that, wading out, floating my board beside me, I was once hit by a wave that was just so thin and transparent that…
No, okay; you don’t have to believe me.
So, here’s another memory: My mom built a fire on the beach, sort of standard surf stuff, from the plentiful supply of driftwood. Out in the water; Phillip points to the uniformed ranger sort of marching down the beach.
So, you have the image of the Smokey Bear-hat wearing ranger; add in the sort-of-chunky mother of seven, undoubtedly wearing a dress, and there’s the face-to-face, then the Ranger kicking sand on the fire meant to warm her children… and my mom’s back in his face;  and we’re imagining that she’s saying “The park’s not even open yet,” and “this is what we’ve always done,” and the Ranger’s threatening some sort of action, and…
…And he left, eventually; and my mom restarted the fire, we got warm, and she didn’t bring us back there.
But I did go back. I went back after the park opened, but day-surfers had to rotate onto a small ledge and sneak around the fence to get to the most consistent peak, Pipes Proper, or to what my high school surfing friends and I referred to as Swamis beachbreak.

When Trish and I lived in Encinitas in the mid-70s, Pipes was the main place I surfed in the area, always with an eye toward Swamis; occasionally braving the crowd there.
For the past twelve years or so, Pipes Proper has been the designated ‘home break’ for my friend Ray Hicks. He parks on the highway, passing the crew of surfers, most around our age, who, possibly retired (Ray’s still working), have purchased the yearly park pass, and watch the surf from the parking lot inside the fence, at the bluff.  Ray, already in trunks or wetsuit, cruises down the ramp/access, drops off his sandals at the rip-rack rocks, paddles out, usually to the main peak.

It all seems kind of casual to me, sort of friendly.  Sure, Ray has had two pairs of sandals stolen, replaced with cheaper models, and now he just wears the cheaper models himself; and, yes, it does get crowded when it’s good, even when it’s not, but once in a while Ray writes me about memorable rides and memorable sessions, the water so clean, the waves so thin and transparent that…

 

Winter At Sea- final? drawing

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Winter At Sea- final? drawing

Okay, so some of us can’t leave well enough alone. First I published the drawing with some notes as emailed to me by the artist, my sister, Melissa Lynch. Then she wrote back to say she wasn’t comfortable with my mentioning how she didn’t want to draw attention to any possible, unmeant religious implications of the drawing.
Then I wrote the story to go with the drawing; but, not totally pleased with the version, I went back in, edited it “in the cloud,” inserting Melissa’s drawing. Of course, I deleted the original posting of the drawing, so no one who didn’t see that post even knew there is no intended religious meaning to the drawing.
Then Melissa sent me another, final drawing. Thanks. So, I totally slowed my computer down trying to insert the new drawing into the text I didn’t want to further change… yet.
The drawing was too small, so, screw with the editing, several times, give up, and, and this is the result. Please read the story. Go back and forth if you have to.
Next time you drop in… well, we’ll all see.

Old (and new) Friends, Acquaintances, Others, and More Magic

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First, thanks to all those who have been supportive of realsurfers.net in its inaugural year. Thanks to those who have written back (like Corky Carroll, just to drop one name- and I plan on bugging him for any photo of James Arness at San Onofre for a future story), and those who have found my site, and, kindly, connected their network of friends. And thanks to anyone who, maybe surfing around the internet, came upon real surfers.

That some of my stories featuring wonderful characters (real people, actually) have touched others who knew these surfers better than I did in my brief encounters with them touches me.

I realize the whole site appears dis-organized. Maybe my memory is like several competing big ass storms at sea, a little too close. Each story leads to another, others, and there are sets of stories. I get interrupted by some rogue thing, some new adventure I just have to write about.

It has been a great joy for me to work on this; and I’m still in the drop-in, line-up phase, not free-falling, but hoping to catch an edge.

Thanks for dropping in.

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What I’ve picked up on is just how many wonderful people I’ve had the pleasure to share a few sessions with in my lifetime obsession with this splendid distraction. While I continue to find new adventures, meet new real surfers, I also miss so many of my early surf compatriots. We were lucky to surf and to come of age in a time that now seems magical.

Oh, it all seems magical to me; and the magic continues; out there, lines on the horizon, a first wave showing on the indicator, lining-up, raising, steepening. Swallow the lump in your throat, turn, partway, set, paddle like you mean it.

My we all have even more magic for the next years.

Bill Birt and the San Onofre Octopi

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Bill Birt and the San Onofre Octopi

Weekly (until I run out of them) Bill Birt Story
Before I posted it here I ran my story, “The Ghost of Bill Birt,” past the only friend from my Fallbrook surfing days I’m still in contact with, Ray Hicks, now living in Carlsbad, and still surfing.
“What a character,” Ray wrote, also mentioning in the e-mail the story he claims he’ll never forget; the one about Bill and the octopi at a minus tide 1967 San Onofre.*
With the rest of some subgroup of Fallbrook Sophomore surfers- Phillip Harper, Ray Hicks, probably Mark Metzger, Billy McLean, me, standing around a beach fire between sessions, standard practice in those days of short john wetsuits, Bill was down with the old beachcombers and the young kids examining the tide pools.
You should bear in mind that most of us were sixteen, Billy fourteen**, and we didn’t get all excited about sea urchins and starfish and the like. That is, we wouldn’t want someone else in our group to see us get excited about the perfect sand dollar. We were, no doubt, talking about whether we’d go out again, comparing rides; some talk, no doubt, about girls- so much more mysterious than waves.
So, here came Bill, glasses on but fogged by salty damp air, trudging up the fairly level beach- maybe more like marching- huge smile on his face, and, when he got close enough, we could see he had an octopus wrapped around one arm, another sort of cradled at stomach level.
There was a moment of…”Wait! What? Hey!”
Bill threw one of the live creatures onto into the fire. It just as well could have been a grenade. We all leapt backwards.
“Bill!”
There were, of course, other first verbal reactions, most one syllable; or an extended “Shhhhhhhhhiiiiiiiiii…..” Someone may have shrieked.
No, not me.
And if I did; well; there was an octopus in the fire!
Bill looked at each of us, each of us equally horrified, and said, quite matter-of-factly, lifting the remaining octopus, obviously still alive, to eye level, moving it in a circle for each of us to appreciate. “This one’s smaller; we’ll eat it first.”***
*Because one story leads to another story, or even another group of stories, in writing this I discovered I have to tell more ‘San Onofre Tales.’ I’m working on it.
**Billy McLean is another character from my past. His slightly-crazed personality, his knack for getting otherwise-peaceful friends into trouble, no doubt aligns with some member of at least one subgroup of your own surfing contemporaries. I’m working on a few Billy McLean stories (physically wincing at the thought).
And, of course, I have a few more on Bill Birt.
***The second octopus went back in the tide pools, all of us marching down to make sure; someone apologizing to it for the murder of its friend.
No, not me. And if I did…