Stuart Nettle

May 20, 2009

I live and die by the forecast charts.

No, no, that's putting it a bit too strongly.

My life takes on meaning depending upon the forecast charts.

That's better...

Going on averages I'm about halfway through my life, which means that I'm fairly well settled into the routine of being me. Work has become rote, weekend's a blur, catching up with friends a pleasant obligation. Oh, I do it all with a smile but during those activities I often wish I were doing something else.

Surfing of course.

So I check the forecast charts religiously - every morning, every noon, every night. And if the immediate future is looking bleak I pray that on the seventh day - out there on the forecasting frontier of 168 hours - to see a blob of concentric coloured circles take shape.

Because then my life can take shape!

 If I know a swell is coming there is instant structure in my life. There is purpose in my being and urgency in my work. Every peak moment in my half-completed life has involved surfing; I want to experience more of them.

If I know a swell is coming there is also anticipation. Do I have the right boards? How big will it get? Am...I...ready? Questions that jolt me out of mundane drudgery and into Preparation Mode. Then each day leading up to the swell is referenced to the day the swell is due and in that way they are ticked off like the countdown before an old feature film.

Then the surf...

And after that it's back to the forecast charts.

Friedrich Nietzsche explained the purpose of his philosophical quest as "trying to find a way to live between the music" such was his love for classical music, and the peak moments that listening to it provided. Moments when nothing else mattered - the pain of existence, the hypocrisy of society, the leaky bathroom tap. I have a similar dilemma; how do I live between the swells? Well, I have the forecast charts that can hold out hope. But when the charts fall flat...it's time to read Nietzsche.