It was the calm before the storm. Another morning where the sky dripped honey into the ocean, turning it to beer. Not just any beer, the pale yellow kind, with condensation dripping from the outside of a clear Mexican bottle. A wistful kind of beer.
The light, for those energetic enough to seek it out, turned surfers to silhouettes and waves to black walls, looming from the crumpled horizon. But it didn’t last long. By the time the lone longboarder dragged himself home, the beer had turned deep blue – reverse alchemy – and the sun showered the surface with diamonds in consolation.
A new way of measuring wave size
Froth. Perhaps a new way to measure the size of swells? Count the seconds from impact – the lip implodes upon the surface – until the water becomes still again. Four seconds is a small wave on the Froth scale. 20 seconds is something much larger.
“Hey bro, did you check my 22 second Frother?!”
I love the sound of the water fizzing, having just managed a clean duck dive beneath a heaving set wave. You’re paddling anyway, why not count the froth settle time? The froth index.
Or just use feet.
Tomorrow you’ll see the waves that came later in the day. The quality of a swell is always reflected by the number of surfers who are out there at the tail-end of it.
When what would normally be packed conditions are enjoyed only by a few stragglers, you know the rest are surfed out, begging their better halves for shoulder rubs, kicking back in the afterglow.
Perhaps with one of those golden beers that makes you happy you’re living someone else’s dream.
