Big Sunday

A memoir about a young man leaving the family nest. Rites of passage from a privileged teenager naively encountering the adult world with a never look back attitude.

Warning - contains in depth surfing knowledge.

Big Sunday 

My mother will not be happy! 

The 190 Palm Beach bus induced a dream-like state meandering slowly along Sydney’s northern beaches. Keeping to a timetable set for peak hour, approaching midnight there would barely be a vehicle in sight; a snail’s pace. The monotony was like a lull, drifting towards idle thoughts. I would be tired after a long day’s work, my first real job: a drawing office of an architectural firm by day followed by night classes at University.

The pattern of my early working life was bordered morning and night with this ninety minute commute. Change became a constant tic. What will my mother say? There was the weight of expectation. I was privileged, although I was yet to fully appreciate the degree. Change felt inevitable – but to what? 

From our house on a headland overlooking the beach, I would peer out the kitchen window to watch the white foaming breakers in the moonlight. Wonder what the surf was like today? Mum, bless her, always left dinner for me, warm in the oven, often with a treat like lemon delicious pudding - my favourite! She was a farmer’s daughter who at my age was working in a small town bank while the men were at war. Her ambition for me stemmed from what was unavailable to a wartime rural young woman.

She was the one who ticked the box on the university application. Apparently I showed some aptitude toward technical drawing. Both my parents agreed it would be the best option. 

Dad played golf with the head architect at the firm and landed me the position in the drawing office, a sort of an apprentice you might say. I spent months doing plan alterations for industrial buildings, toilets seemed to be forever shifting. Painting trees on concept plans was another task. They all had to be green, no russet, taupe, amber or puce, and definitely no flame … just green, thank you! 

After a year I found myself another workplace, a small practice with just a few architects and other students. No sooner had I started than we amalgamated with an engineer who decided I would be the ideal delivery person for plans and documents. My knowledge of Sydney inner city and suburbs is second to none as a result.

I felt conflicted. I was not attracted to the life I saw ahead of me, but then I couldn’t offer an alternative. How much of the ache of exhaustion was the loss of my surfing life? During my school years I would surf daily, at dawn or late afternoon as long as conditions allowed, and on holidays my mates and I would congregate in a semi permanent camp at the back of the beach, under trees in summer and around a fire in winter. 

My beachcomber lifestyle had been curtailed. So it was that weekends held forth the fast fading remnants of indulgent youth. I can vividly recall a particular Sunday when my mate Ray and I were frustrated with a weekend of stormy weather, big seas and wild surf conditions closing all the beaches up and down the coast. We decided to search out a hunch. The weather was improving, wind had dropped, and there was a big clean swell coming from the northeast. 

We strapped our boards onto Ray’s car and drove north. From the top of the hill Avalon came into view, huge waves breaking in long lines from headland to headland; un-rideable, even if you did manage to paddle and fight your way out through the breaking waves. Descending down to Whale Beach, the story was the same. We headed to the far end of Palm Beach, a sort of end of the line nature sanctuary, the northern most part of metropolitan Sydney. A long narrow sand isthmus connected a hammer shaped headland called Barrenjoey. A lighthouse stood on the highest point as a signal to shipping for the entrance to Broken Bay and the Hawkesbury River. 

We stopped in the empty car park about a kilometre from the headland, high anticipation as we looked down the beach. Neither of us had ever surfed here before nor knew anyone who had. Prospects were not immediately good; we knew it even without speaking. Waves were all just dumping in long lines, no chance to ride across the unbroken green part of the wave, the basic idea of surfing. Just as we were about to give up and drive off, a set, a handful of larger waves broke out past the headland, rolling as long left hand breaking waves a good distance before crashing powerfully, foaming white water charging to the beach. I recall one of us mumbling, ‘possible?’

Whereas at other times we would discuss movement of the tide or shape of sandbanks, in this instance, nothing was said. Ten minutes later another set. Basically I don’t think we would individually commit but collectively we talked ourselves into going out. Call it youthful bravura or male insecurity about ‘chickening out’. Hindsight points to this moment as an opportunity for another perspective, one that might consider risk, endangering others, limits of human exploits and alike. Come to think of it we had told no one where we were going. 

So it was then, we walked north along the deserted beach. On a sunny day there would be many beachgoers and surfers but today the inclement weekend deterring all but seagulls. A long walk in soft sand and the first impression was just how much bigger the waves were once we arrived at the rocky headland. The windscreen estimate a kilometre back, now feeling like a rookie error. Forget trying to paddle out off the beach, our only option was to rock hop towards the tip of the headland and hopefully find a jumping off ledge or rock. Clearly dangerous but we stood and observed as waves lashed against rocks and flooded over ledges to our feet. With pungent salt air in our faces, the aim was simple; paddle far enough out to avoid being washed back onto the rocks.

We chose our spot, the plan was to wait till the larger set waves had passed, then in the likely lull, scamper to the edge of the rock ledge and jump, paddle like crazy, at worst only having to roll under one or two smaller broken waves, and then out into deep water. Surprisingly this we both achieved with no problem but our minds were on the thought of the inevitable big set. Bobbing out beyond the breaking waves it was very hard to know just where to place ourselves so as not to get ‘cleaned up’ as we called it. Caught in front of a large breaking set wave also known as being ‘hammered’. We drifted apart. I could see rocks deep underneath amongst the sandy bottom. The beach was but a distant brushstroke.

*

She definitely was not pleased!

After leaving Sydney it took almost two years before I arrived in Adelaide. A circuitous route via market gardening, sawmill hand and carpenter’s assistant. One night, out at a social evening in a small rural town, I had tried my hand at making pottery. Three months later I decided to enroll at the South Australian School of Art.

It was a rare occasion for a surf film to show in Adelaide, so I was keen to go. A surfer from Sydney’s northern beaches filmed a small group of friends living a carefree existence roaming Australian coastlines, spending months driving from beach to beach. A happy band enjoying languid days and the delights of the ocean; perfect, was my dominant sense, envy a close second. Only the guys surfed, the beautiful girlfriends hung out in the kombi and played with the Irish setter dogs. I had invited a friend to come with me, she had a background in social justice, worked in a women’s shelter and was big into student union affairs within the art school environment. At the film’s conclusion as I was satiated in the surf nomad dream, she said to me, ‘I thought they were like spoilt brats!’

Well talk about epiphany! I really liked and respected her and this was not some idle observation. It really affected me, bolt from the blue, rug from under me, spanner in the works, head in the sand, up the wrong tree, under a bus? Maybe not quite the bus but you get the picture. Okay, they were privileged, their lifestyle unobtainable to most … I began to understand her misgivings, particularly once you looked outside of the sun drenched, sandy haired, typical surfer. I have often thought about it since then, and have pondered its meaning to what is undoubtedly a positive occurrence. Safe to say it made me question more and consider a wider world.

Art School in Adelaide was good for me in so many ways; it opened my horizons as I met so many new and different people. It wasn’t without its problems as I had disappointed my mother having given up my Architecture studies. She was understandably concerned, sometimes angry. I was determined to use my time wisely as my priorities shifted. Art, whilst allied to architecture was very much an unknown quantity for my parents. My passion for surfing was overtaken by an interest in art. Redemption took place when my work won a national award. My parents stood in for me at the Sydney presentation. Meeting the Premier of NSW was thereafter a much spoken about rolled gold parent highlight.

As my Adelaide sojourn approached a decade I had made a successful career,  established my own studio, and my contact with surfing mates had waned. In days before social media, living half way across a continent made communication more difficult. Jobs, marriages, and children - we all moved and changed. My opportunities and inclination to surf were sporadic at best.

*

Floating around on the moving currents of a restless ocean, we had been sizing up the swells for some time and I was keen to catch my first wave. I tried for one but fell off the back as it passed beneath me. Paddling back out I crested the next swell and caught site of big lumps on the distant horizon. The effort to catch a wave had meant I had drifted both towards the rocks and shore, now it was the set approaching and I put my head down and paddled wondering how big and how far out they would break. I had lost track of where Ray was but all I could think about was getting some distance out. The lumps were building like you get in cyclone swells, long and straight, heading my way. The next few minutes would be critical. Heart racing I made every stroke count, then as if from above came a long, loud, authoritative voice.

‘PADDLE!’

I put my whole body into it, maximum effort. Who was that? Must be someone up high, God maybe! Probably a hiker on the headland near the lighthouse, their view a panorama compared to my picture at sea level obscured by waves closer. Then, a sinking feeling, I could see what I was dealing with; a huge wall of water rose above the horizon and occupied most of the sky. Travelling fast it stood tall and started to feather at the top. Paddling away from the peak as it broke about thirty meters to my left, I pushed up and burst through the lip, being showered in spray, praying not to be sucked back as I banged down and almost slid off my board. I knew full well that the first of the set was not usually the biggest so there was no time to do anything but keep paddling! 

Then again the voice, ‘PADDLE! … PADDLE!’ an even more urgent tone this time.

I took the advice onboard, digging deep, arms at full stretch. The second was a monster, rising and threatening. Way over to my left and out past the headland it peaked, a three storey wall of water hurtling towards me. I just headed further and further out as the mountain of water approached. Rising to tipping point the wave was thunderous. I was confronted with a vertical wall. Paddling up and up I slammed over the top, sliding off, then losing my board momentarily as the wave threw itself forward and crashed behind me. I swam to recover my board and scrambled back on, quickly trying to orientate myself, having been dragged towards shore. Luckily the third was not as large as the previous, but still I had to hustle and just managed to push the nose of the board through the breaking lip. A wave this size is thick like the width of a bus, so its momentum is a force to reckon with, punching through the breaking top hair-raising. Worst-case scenario is being pulled backwards down into the cylindrical churn of the breaking wave.

There was no fourth! 

A white carpet of foam spread all the way to the beach where I could see a distant lone figure - Ray on the water’s edge looking out. In the ensuing lull all was quiet. Out past the headland I felt lost at sea. I know how those intrepid fishermen hunkered down in Hokusai’s woodblock print ‘The Great Wave’ must have felt, their boat caught in huge waves with a tiny Mount Fuji in the background. Barrenjoey lighthouse was similarly dwarfed by the magnitude. No sign or sound of any hiker?

*

Over the years I have sometimes replayed those three waves, fancifully seeing myself paddling up the wave face, then at the last second swivelling around and without even paddling, pushing my weight forward, standing, taking the vertical drop as I strive to balance, just managing to keep the nose above water. With arms spread wide like a tightrope walker, I arc a big bottom turn so as to slide across the green face, trim and angle the board as the wave feathers and cascades over my head. The whole time racing what sounds like a barrelling express train nipping at my heels. Air trapped in the tubular breaking wave blasts out and sprays my back pushing me even faster. My agility tested as I finally direct my board up and over, crouching to grab the edge with one hand whilst soaring into midair to spear down behind the breaking wave, bobbing to the surface like a cork to bask beatific. 

Waves like these travel for thousands of kilometres, a phenomenal amount of dynamic energy that then dissipates in seconds. A Japanese film, ‘Still the Water’, described waves breaking on shorelines as a ‘death’. The power of nature visually arresting as waves break and release their energy to collectively weather rocks, shape beaches and landforms. Surfer’s experience that power should they fall, or get caught with a wave breaking in front, the force pushing them underwater into a churning mass far stronger than oneself. Best bet is to go limp and wait till the wave has passed before surfacing, the bigger the wave the longer the hold down. 

On the other hand, to succeed, to ride that free energy, to sample the potency, can be euphoric. Utilizing your body as a dancer might, being fearless, in the moment leave regrets in your wake. The only marks left are memories; all else is erased.

*

On a rare visit to Sydney I was invited to a Sunday lunch reunion with a bunch of my surfing buddies. It was great to catch up and hear their life stories after so many years. Casually I asked where Ray was and the room fell silent. The softly spoken answer laid bare some gut wrenching news; Ray had passed away having taken his own life. 

Maybe I had lived a fortunate life, this was the first death in my peer group and it really rocked me. Ray’s life was one of struggle, father died when he was young, mother remarried, and he and the stepfather didn’t get on. He felt unwelcome at home, bombed out of school, worked at menial jobs that changed often. Memorable was his version of Lee Marvin’s ‘I was born under a wandering star’ - the look, the croaky voice. The last time I saw him I visited for a weekend. We went up the coast surfing, sleeping rough on the beach. I can remember his girlfriend being displeased, not wanting to come and staying home. 

We had not seen each other in years but I was aware he was working in a psychiatric institution. Apparently one of his patients had made a complaint against him and he choose to end it all. What else was going on in his life at the time I have no idea, but it leaves you with a sense of needless loss and your own inadequacy, where you ponder the why didn’t I, what if, and if only?

And just like big wave surfing you don’t get a second chance. 

Scott Avery  

2020