Early on a Wednesday morning, as I checked Suis from Makalei Beach Park, Boogie Pete — Sponge Pa to his family — appeared with his bodyboard, fins and a plastic bag.
It’s rare for me to see Pete arrive, as I’m not an early riser and he paddles out at dawn, when the sky and sea beyond the reef are alight but the inshore waters remain shadowed by Diamond Head.
He paused to discuss the surf. I didn’t have time for the small, windblown waves. But Pete, a hotel bartender who works the day shift, goes surfing year-round, no matter what the conditions, on his precious two days off.
“I’ve been out in worse,” he said.
On the empty beach, he set down his things and, taking handfuls of pink plumeria from his plastic bag, waded into the sea and tossed them high in the air, where they hung for a moment like stars. He bowed his head and said a few words before grabbing his board and fins and heading out.
Later that day I emailed Pete to apologize for intruding on his privacy and to hope no one had died.
No apologies, he replied.
“It’s just my way of saying thanks. I usually whisper a message to recently departed friends.”
He added, “I always ask this guy that worked at the hotel to watch over me when I’m out there. Superstitious? Maybe. Don’t think it hurts.”
Pete’s not alone. Most surfers, I think, ask our guardian spirits to protect us in the sea. I say a little prayer of thanks after a good wave, not just for the wave but for all the good people and experiences in my life, this amazing ride that just keeps going until it ends in the big sleep.
We lose places as well as people in the course of our lives. Like the coral reefs, sandbars and points that shape them, surf breaks are vulnerable to storms and man-made change.
I asked John Clark, retired Honolulu City & County lifeguard and author of “Hawaiian Surfing: Traditions from the Past,” if he could share a remembrance of a departed break.
He could, and did.
“(It) was one of my all-time favorite spots, a steep, barreling right called Garbage Hole,” Clark replied in an email. “It was directly across the boat channel from Ala Moana Bowls, but not too many people surfed it because it was dangerous and broke on a really shallow reef.”
Clark and his friend David Maki were regulars at Garbage Hole from 1958 to 1964, the year it was buried by the construction of the Magic Island peninsula. “Now when there’s a big south swell, all that’s left is the outside peak that breaks right on the boulders.”
Over time, other spots on Oahu’s south shore have been altered by landfills from the reef runway to Waikiki, Clark continued, but the complete destruction of Garbage Hole was perhaps the most dramatic example.
“I believe it was one of the major reasons that John Kelly founded Save Our Surf,” he said.
At least the loss of Garbage Hole led to positive action by the surfers Kelly organized to protect Hawaii’s natural environment along Sandy Beach and other shores. Save Our Surf was a forerunner to Surfrider Foundation, which for 15 years has led a campaign to restore the surf break in Long Beach, known as the Waikiki of Southern California back in the day.
My husband Don’s family is from Long Beach, and his father and uncle used to reminisce about lifeguarding at the beach and bodysurfing the big, well-shaped waves. The surf vanished in 1949 when a breakwater was built.
Don, who loves his hometown but was born too late to surf there, dreams of getting the chance someday.
When Pete floats in the lineup on his back, he reminds me of a sea otter with his round head, smiling, mustached face and flippered feet. Relaxed and merry, he never fails to cheer me up.
Get up early, Boogie Pete keeps urging.
“The kids aren’t out at dawn patrol,” he said.
But lately, I think what he’s also saying is we should enjoy our time to the max.
“In the Lineup” features Hawaii’s oceangoers and their regular hangouts, from the beach to the deep blue sea. Reach Mindy Pennybacker at mpennybacker@staradvertiser.com or call 529-4772.
