Eternal Vigilance

Last Friday, New Year's Eve, me, my brother, our friend Garret, and about ten other guys (and some girls) stood stoically on the beach patiently waiting on the wind to shift. It was a period of hopeful anticipation. The promise was one of a coming cool-front that would turn the winds offshore and shape the waves for the most epic day of the season. Three o'clock, they said. That's when the front would hit. So we all stood there, staring through the sea-fog and watched the waves, waiting for that moment when the foam would start to be blown off the top, signifying the switch.

Sunday was the Feast of the Epiphany, celebrating the arrival of the magi in Bethlehem. If I were smarter I would have thought about the connection as we waited on the winds. I would have have thought about how we were like those magi, led to the beach on a promise but still not really knowing what we would find when we got there. I would have thought about how they followed a star the same way I'm following the palms, watching to see if there is a change in the direction they're blowing. I would have thought about these guys trekking across hundreds of miles of desert to go to a backwater town in a backwater Roman province. I might have made the connection when my brother said, "Let's just get in. That way we'll already be out there when it shifts. We can be first." Now, I must admit, that's not exactly what he said, I cleaned it up a lot. But the thought stands: to go into the unknown, to be first, to be willing to risk the chop and the rip-tide to get the first waves. To have your place before the others realize they need to paddle out.

Because I'm not smarter, I made no such connection. Instead I ran around on the beach like a child, cursed the wind for not shifting, damned the fog for being so foggy, and made fun of the way my friends looked in their wetsuits. When my brother insisted that we paddle out, I did go. The water was cold (or should I say, the water is cold) and it would have been very easy to make up an excuse to go in. After all, the wind was still blowing on-shore and the fog was holding on pretty good. But I went anyway. And, yes, we were the the only three out. And even though nothing had changed to create the epic day we were all hoping for, the waves were still big and not too choppy. We were able to surf all we wanted while everyone else waited on the beach. I know what you're thinking, yeah, but when the wind does turn you'll be too tired to surf. No, you're wrong. Because, as darkness started to fall, the wind still hadn't shifted. If we had waited, we wouldn't have surfed at all. If we had sat there, waiting on a perfect certainty, we never would have left the beach.