I came in from the surf today, put my board on the railing and turned on the old shower at Narrabeen to wash the salt off. Maybe I'd had too much sun, or not enough food, or I was just going crazy from working in The Cupboard all week, but as I stood under the shower I thought of all the amazing characters that have stood under this same spurt of water over the years.
I'm not entirely sure how old the shower is, but I think it's early '70's. As I stood there lost in my liquid meditation, I remembered a picture in an old surfing magazine of Tony Hardwick, in about 1974, standing in this same post surf position, rinsing the salt off. The article was about Wicka and what was happening in his life, changing from "the mouth" of Northy to a responsible father and business owner. I remember seeing it in his scrap book when Dan (his son) and I were grommets. And here I was standing under this same shower, doing the same post surf ritual: board on the railing, tap on, watch surf, rinse the salt off, think about the waves just ridden. I've been doing it for as long as I can remember, it feels good, but it was only today that the sense of history hit me. Everyone from Midget Farrelly to Kelly Slater has stood in this exact position, rinsing the salt and mentally surfing the next set coming through. Pretty cool.
Just like the subway in NYC, the beach shower is also the great leveler of class and ego. It doesn't matter if you're the world champ or a sunburnt grommet, we all still stand next to the same clump of crappy concrete after a surf and wait for that spurt of fresh water to hit our salty faces.
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