Nightglow Window

The Song Of Summer

The van is coasting down Tamarack, the fuel gauge buried in the red zone. This one is gonna be close.

Have to pull up at the stop sign. Someday (or rather some night) I'm just going to let it coast, straight through the stop signs and down past the shopping center. I'm certain the momentum would carry the car to the beach, two miles from our house.

But not today. We don't run out and make it to the gas station. We fill up. It's about $45 at $3.27 a gallon. Spendy.

So why the heck are we about to drive 30 miles to the beach when there's one not a mile away? Let's back up.

Sydney and her friends (quietly) stayed up until 3:00 a.m. last night, and were still dead to the world at 9:00 a.m. But after a little coaxing we all got in the van and went down to the corner of Roosevelt and Grand, to our favorite donut station. (This place is almost worth a post in itself, with its long counter, eclectic cast of locals, Thai owners, and drive through.)

We then went down to Tamarack, sat in the sand, ate our donuts and drank orange juice, and watched the surfers. Sydney and her friends are really tired.

The surf looks pretty good, but there's just something about Tamarack that doesn't rev me up. Tama-no-fre. (Like San Onofre -- mushy waves and lots of longboarders.)

I knew T-street was the call.

That stretch of coast from Cotton's Point to the San Clemente Pier is where my heart still resides. So much happened there, and no place is more special to me than T-Street.

It's been 33 years since I started coming there regularly (yep, I was a six year old boogieboard renting grom who could peer into the snack bar, but only on my tip toes.) When I was pulled away from the coast for my three years of inland exile in Pleasanton in the fifth, sixth, and seventh grade, it was T-street that came to mind whenever I thought of the beach.

I got drunk for the first time at T-street. Felt the invincible swagger of camaraderie as I became a local there in the early 80s.

I fell in love for the first time there on the beach at T-street, and it's where I hope they spread some of my ashes in about 40 (wonderful and happy) years from now.

So this morning we went home and Sydney's friends were picked up. Then we went up the coast to my favorite place.

The surf is cracking and a yellow flag is up. After I finally get my contacts in, I paddle out. It's the real deal today. The longshore current is fierce, and the waves powerful. I make a lackadaisical duck dive through my first set wave of the day and am rewarded with a serious drubbing, whipped upside down.

Oh yeah!

I catch a few waves at main peak before my first real set wave comes in.

At the risk of sounding like an arrogant prick, but I also like T-street because I can dominate out there. I know every peak, rock, and boil; know what happens when a set swings wide and when Cropley's Bowl is better than Main Peak or Beach House.

So I had no challengers on this first real set, a head-high reeling left that swung wide through the Main Peak lineup. The take off and first cutback was nothing special, but then the wave began to feel the sand and rock bottom as it raced through Cropley's (named for the once-owner of the T-street snack bar). I stalled and posed (poseur!) and the lip came over my head. The final section hit the shallows and the floor fell out. I was pitted for a good ten yards before I raced out.

Best wave since Cabo!

After a while I paddle over to Beach House and watch the sets march up the coast from State Park. Beach House is a special place that only gets good a few times a year. Today isn't one of them. But it's still has enough push that I have to remind myself to land flat after kamikazeing a close out and the bottom drops out to nearly dry sand. I land on my back as the wave unloads, pinning me to the bottom for a few disorienting and thrilling seconds. My sinuses are still draining (drip, drip, drip) from that thrashing.

So it was fun.

Once back on shore the tide is coming up and Sydney and Hannah are in the shorebreak, getting worked and having a ball. During my 90 minute session the beach has gotten totally out of control. The whole world is here it seems and umbrellas sprout like mushrooms after a week-long rain.



But no matter. I read and lounge, and Hannah pours water on my feet, and I people watch and gaze up to Cotton's Point and daydream. When I get hot I jump back in the water (damn that longshore current. No wonder the lifeguards are running helter skelter on rescues). After another hour or so we call it a day. I head off early to make the trek to the car -- nearly to my high school friend Lara's house it seems. Well, maybe not that far. The girls are waiting for me when I pull down the hill and after we load up we head to Senor Pedro's for lunch.

The song of summer. How could anything possibly drown out that sweet tune?