Red

The night paled away into insignificance and reluctantly gave way to the first faint feints of deepening dawn. We had walked out underneath the stars as usual, to claim the first waves of the day. Out in front, wheeling his steady progress through the night sky, was Orion, him that fella of the big bow shooting action, forever and all eternity aiming his arrow at faraway Sirius, bright and distinct against the cold black velvet of the winter night. Off to the other side, reliable as always, proudly heralding and overseeing the dawning of the new day, Venus. Always in the same spot, always the brightest in the sky, always the last to wink out when finally swamped and overtaken by the steady advance of the blue sky, melting away before the heat of the daytime sun.

   Waves had been plentiful and enjoyable in the solitude of the pre-dawn, when all other sane and reasonably-minded people were holed up in their sleeping cocoons. The water was breaking in a perfect way right there on the rocks where we like to sit, and after each ride into the dark we had paddled back up, skirting wide around the break to stay out of the way of our mates, and as soon as we had arrived back at the sweet take-off spot another wave had ambled along amiably and presented itself for a ride of joy and bliss back into the wild black. There was really nothing to complain about.

   I had been struggling for a while with my balance on my board, and had found myself missing out on several good and tidy waves that I really should have gotten onto, by rights. Instead of sliding gloriously down into the green hole I found myself slipping ingloriously down the white rubbish heap of rejected surf attempts, down the back of the bubbles and going nowhere fast. Then, out of the murky, deep, dark, suspicious and insalubrious depths, pits and chasms of my memory a recollection reared its ugly head, and, sneaking like an illicit lover out of the bedroom window of a nun, like I used to, it appeared in front of me like the Ghost of Uncaught Waves Past.

   Because I have been on a downward spiralling trajectory of trying to learn how to surf, and, of late, trying to improve a little bit on the tiny amount of skill that I have managed to acquire, against all odds and surprising no one more than me, I often ask more experienced surfers in the line-up for advice, opinions and pointers. So there was one time when I had been talking to a mate of ours who goes by the name of The Ski Racer, so named because when he stands on his board he adopts a crouch that is uncannily reminiscent of the stance of a telemark skier from the 1930s, complete with and resplendent in an outfit including plus-four pants, woollen socks, a tweed jacket with leather elbow patches, aviator goggles and a knit beanie with bonus bobble perched jauntily on his head. The olden-time posters where I’ve seen the image in the past always pictured this fella as desperately trying to ski away as fast as he could from an avalanche roaring down the mountain behind him, possible caused by himself. Now, people could be forgiven for thinking that woolen socks and a tweed jacket are an odd choice of equipment to wear in the surf, but there’s just no accounting for tastes and preferences and it can easily be imagined how on a smarting freezing day with the southerly blowing hard that solid tweed suit is really going to keep you warm. Who are we to judge. To each their own. In any case The Ski Racer is a very experienced surfer, as well as, as it so happens, and excellent skier, and when he says something I shut up and listen.

   What he told me a fair while ago is, when paddling onto a wave, to keep the head down as low as possible, with the chin on the board in front of you, to keep the centre of balance as low as possible, to assist in making the drop, especially when there is some doubt. I have been doing this with reasonable success in the past, and then every now and then I forget about it until I remember again, like I just had.

   So when the next wave came along and it was my turn, I smashed my chin down hard and painfully onto the fibreglass deck in front of me, carefully mopped up the blood squirting from my chin as a result and kindly and considerately feeding it to the sharks following me around like puppy dogs, squinted up cockeyedly through the impenetrable jungle of my eyebrows, and realised that I could see exactly nothing beyond a dirty smear of stale wax two centimetres in front of me. Undaunted by the unfortunate handicap of now effectively being blinded I paddled on anyway, and, lo and behold, I felt the board move underneath me, setting itself on the downward trajectory I had been aiming for.

   So I jumped, sight unseen, trusting that the way down wouldn’t be too hard to find, with a little assistance of gravity. As it turned out it wasn’t, and it worked a treat: I glided down a perfect green slope onto the shoulder of the wave, and, forcibly removing my chin from the board and leaving behind half a beard and several square centimetres of spare skin, surplus to requirements, landed on my feet in a perfect wave riding position. This involves, in my particular case, both feet planted as far and wide apart as humanly possible without ending up with a strained crotch and sprained testicles, arse pointing proudly out and upwards to the dawn sky, and head firmly wedged between the knees, ready to kiss the arse goodbye any second now. I have often been complimented on my innovative and creative surfing stance, and flattering comparisons with natural born surfing heroes of the natural world, such as baboons, are often heard to be made. Dunno why.

   It had worked beautifully, and I rode that wave triumphantly until it petered out at the far side of the bay. Elated and well pleased with my cunning stunt I paddled back up again, pulled up next to mates and sat up on my board.

   There in front of us the sun had started coming up, as it often does around that time of day, and it had started painting the sky the most glorious red I have ever seen. Every sunrise is different, and I never get enough of watching it happen, of watching the colours shift and transform and metamorphose, of the interplay between shadow and light, and of the sheer mindless breathtaking beauty of it all. Planet Earth is magnificent.

   So, while my mates were having a yarn about something or other off to my left side, on an impulse I laid down on my board, folded my hands underneath my chin, stretched out languorously, yawned for good measure and for the look of the thing, and relaxed, bobbing up and down gently with the rise of the swell. I tuned out of the conversation to the side, no longer listening and keeping up, and let it wash around me like a pleasant background buzz: ‘rhubarb rhubarb rhubarb’. My eyes were now almost level with the surface of the ocean, and as the light grew in intensity it changed to a deep dark fiery red the likes of which are only seldom seen on the water; and, somehow or other, this red light infused the water all around me, so that I was floating on a patchwork of burgundy shapes, alternated with black shadowy forms, floating and bobbing all around. It looked as if the surface of the ocean had been covered in a checkered layer of floor tiles, black and red, stretching out infinitely into the horizon.

   And I let my mind wander.

   It does anyway at the best of times, but this time I thought back to something that had happened just the day before.

   I had been working with disabled children.

   For a living I teach outdoor adventure activities. Sometimes I work with disabled people, as I had the previous day. And I had had in my care a kid, a teenager, about 15 or so. He was deaf and mute, and was virtually blind, could only see indistinct shapes, depending on what background they were projected against. He had no way of communicating, was mentally impaired and physically crooked and broken: his arms and elbows and legs and knees were all bent and twisted at impossible angles, and while he could walk after a fashion he spent most of his time strapped into a wheelchair. Strapped because he would worm and squirm his way out of there at the drop of a hat, and try to take off by himself. He was severely autistic and depended on other people for each and every single thing: eating, drinking, and toilet. On that day, as I went to pick him and his friends up for an activity, he had wriggled out of his chair and was crawling down the length of a hallway, bum on the ground, knees folded and crooked underneath him, moving sideways like a crab and dragging himself across the floor by his knuckles. He had also shat himself, and was leaving a trail of shit along the floor behind him.

   His carers were trying to get him back into his chair and off to the toilet and they were struggling, he wasn’t cooperating, so naturally I went over and gave them a hand. One bloke put his hand under one of his armpits, I put my hand under his other armpit, and on one, two, three we tried to lift him.

   As soon as we did, like lightning his head snapped around and he bit me.

   I flinched and let go, we tried a different approach and eventually we got him mobile and off to the toilet.

   But that is this kid’s life. And it will be forever, for as long as he lives. Which may, in truth, not be very long; or it may.

   The point is that for him there is no escape, no way out, no possible hope of betterment. His condition is set in stone, there is no cure. His DNA is scrambled, and there’s no chance of ever unscrambling it. The thing is that it’s impossible to know whether he knows this, is aware of it, or whether he’s not. Either way he is condemned.

   And this is the all-important thing. Because everywhere you go, everywhere you look, everywhere you listen, there are people complaining about all sorts of things. Nothing is ever quite right or good enough. The weather’s too cold or too hot. A person is too poor or too rich. There’s too much rain, or not enough. Life is too expensive, people are too rude, governments are too corrupt and incompetent. The list goes on.

   And all those things mean nothing, absolutely nothing at all in comparison with the life of this kid in his wheelchair. And of all those people out there who shout and scream abuse and whinge and whine and complain about everything under the sun there is not one, not a single one, who would want to swap their life for this kid’s life for one minute.

   Because from the minute you’ve got two arms and two legs, ears, eyes and a mouth that function, and you’ve got a brain that works and that you can think with, you’re ahead of the game. If you’ve got a pulse and you’re upright and breathing you’ve got absolutely nothing to complain about, and it doesn’t matter if you spend your entire life living in a cardboard box and eating out of rubbish bins. Because that kid in his wheelchair, if he can think at all, he would give absolutely anything to have what we’ve got: health and sanity.

   And that is the absolute bottom line of the human condition.

   I took a deep breath, and another one. I trailed my hands in front of me through the blood-red water, caressed it, felt it, stroked it. Revelled in the sensation of the lukewarm salty seawater on my skin.

   Then I turned around, paddled, put my chin on my board and pulled into a wave.

   It’s good to be alive.