If you’ve ever gotten a “wild hair,” a sudden mobility, like your bones were moving before you knew exactly where you were going, and a sudden draw to be in the ocean overcame you so that nothing mattered until you were there, you will understand. The exhilaration of a night surf, making a section in the pitch black, star or moonlight to separate the bump of an approaching wave from the other black water around you. Or in the daytime a clear sky overhead, mid-day, mid-week—a private moment to yourself, looking at the turquoise sea floor, fluorescent and dancing. The warmth of the sun on your face when you look up. To melt into a moment with pure contentment and curiosity, is a great gift of life.
Surfing needs no adornment, nor does any moment that feels holy. When you are a child, sensations of the world are new and wild. But the things that are new to a child are ancient to humanity. Someone always came before. The original of anything seems to fade into a never-ending line of generations evolving. Perhaps the blight of adulthood is reckoning that there is no “new.” And nothing is as fresh and exhilarating as the first time you experienced it.
Every time in the water is new. Perhaps the pure reason people surf is because of this. And like surfing, psychedelic drugs create an effect of freshness. One can experience a deep knowing, that life is fragile and beautiful and new. There is adventure and risk behind combining psychedelics and surfing. No doubt there is a wild tendency in all of us, and a surfer lives by it, for better or worse. A question of what comes from surfing on psychedelics arises, maybe a spiritual connection with the ocean or the board or your body, maybe a newfound passion for knee-boarding, maybe a snapped board. But if nothing else, at least a good story.
