Kfeen13/weekly weatherman/am strand(4)
third time’s th charm- fourth…? a la tercera va la vencida, a la cuarta-la despedida…? here’s th northerly blowing a wet, grey front onshore & @ th very least it’s a cooling relief from th sticky humid dog days of tropical august… por fin, @ last, endlich, enfin i dove into th water en marchiquita: lately, every time i drive into manatí- to a little health food store & a new ‘wine gallery’ carrying some of frances oliver’s grreat imports (steele, bonny doon, de loach…) -i take th little coast road- a no-brainer, th alternative being th postindustrial car & fast-food worshipping strip la num.2 (‘la militar’, since it was built by th army corps of engineers during ww2) has become…
& i make a point of driving over th little ridge that comes right up to th shore @ that point in th coastline, to check how th waves are breaking… for those of you that don’t know mar chiquita- a perfect little scallop shell of a beach, where th ocean squeezes thru two mounds- tongues?- of jagged brown calcareous rock tall as a two-story house, a third peñón jutting out of th ocean & dividing th entrance channel in two…
th ocean swell has to be pumping in th exact northeasterly direction to throw a lip just inside th channel between th rocks & peel into a perfect tube as th wave opens like a fan… i remember one perfect morning in september of 1976, i believe…alan del castillo had borrowed his mom’s vw beetle for a last day @ th beach before going back to england & his premed studies- for a moment, i thought i was getting a ride to my classes for th day en la yU-Pi-R, before easily getting talkd into a day off…it was perfect. i needed no swimfins to catch up to th swell & be @ th peak to slide down th face of a wave that pitchd out far enough for me to have th most dramatic ‘tubed in’ experience of my life… yes, i useta be a bit of a bodysurfer…it’s broken bigger one or two times since- bigger & still ‘rideable’- but i’ve never managed to catch a seaswell throwing waves that break as clean & perfect as that day…
mahalo- d-(8{>