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This shared feeling, that we were all learning something new, together; made those early years of windsurfing seem both a party and a celebration, where each of us discovered and tested our own strengths, focus, humor; persistence, anal limits.
And then went past what we had done before.
Regardless of whether your sail luffed, or the mast foot had to be wrapped in aluminum foil and
jammed into a horizontal slot in the center of the board, as soon as you stepped onto the water, the salty foam and crisp breeze took you into another reality. Your soul was free to find its way, along the edge of the wind, chasing sparkles along the flickering surface of the water. Checking in with a couple of touring gulls, overhead, the view from here made any problems you left on land smaller and less significant. Whenever the wind picked up, it felt like you were holding onto life with a capital L ..."steering the fast sail of the roses ... stuck into..solid marine madness.*" (* Pablo Neruda, "Drunk with Turpentine")
In my case, there was an eight-year hiatus between windsurfing sessions. It wasn't by choice, but when you come down with a life-threatening illness, the challenges of regaining the ability to walk and talk can take up as much energy as cranking along the crest of a swell at twenty knots. "You'll be lucky if you can walk up stairs," my doctor warned when I asked when I would be well enough to windsurf again. (You can imagine what 1 must have felt, on that day, eight years later, when I faced the water again, wondering if the Zen approach of "great faith, great doubt, and great determination" would work for windsurfing as well.)
Fortunately, I was given one of the original Windsurfers, with a bleached-out wooden boom and floppy, faded 4.5 sail. As if it had been only a few weeks, instead of nearly a decade, the moves came back, instinctively, and soon, the instructor was paddling as fast as he could to catch up. "Lady, are you sure you haven't done this for a few years?"
But it had been years, 1 found, as I started looking for a new windsurfer, only to discover that the new generation was an F-16, compared to that old Wright brothers' plane I used to own.
I started looking for a new windsurfer, only to discover that the new generation was an F-16, compared to that old Wright brothers' plane I used to own.
Along with "faster is better" and "higher is better" and "newer is better," buying, owning, rigging, and windsurfing were now serious business. Gone were the friendly exchanges of tools and tips. The gurus of duct tape having apparently vanished, along with cloth sails and teak daggerboards. Like the nineties themselves, the "New Windsurfing" was a purposeful, take-it-to-the-max activity.
The goal was stoke. The faster the speed, the greater the stoke. In order to get to stoke, you needed a masters' to calculate the ideal ratio of volume, width, and length of board to the specifications of cambered Mylar sail, carbon mast, and boom. Everything had to fit together perfectly or it didn't work. The new sails were unquestionably designed for high performance but they were so finely calibrated that rigging became an excruciating, solitary, and unforgiving ritual. Bring your own rigging tool, and hey, stay in your own space. This mindset raises questions similar to those asked more eloquently in the classic movie, "Inherit the Wind". In pondering the darker side of progress, the hero observes that when air travel becomes part of everyday life, we will be able to cover large distances quickly. But when we can fly like birds, the clouds will smell of gasoline, and the sky will lose its wonder. Our transitions in windsurfing have comparable implications. There is no question that, rigged with a Neil Pryde V5 5.9, a Fiberspar mast, and sailing a Xantos 310, I'm windsurfing twice as fast, in heavier wind, than any of the old gear could handle. But with each of us intent on taking it to the max, there is a self-absorbed intensity to how we windsurf these days, as if we're all in competition with ourselves, if not each other. Tethered to the cutting edge of techno-speed, we've traded harder-faster-higher for the simple fun of hanging out with friends, along with what feels like a part of our collective soul.
A lot of people has been missing out on one of the most mind and body expanding experiences available today.
Although one of the attractions is the media image of big wave-big wind action, the excitement of windsurfing can be felt any time you push off, suspended, as if by magic, between the sea and the sky. People like myself, who have little or no expertise in bump and jump conditions, are just as capable of an enduring passion for the sport, as are the legends and pros, so often photographed looping off those mast-high waves. Yet, because of the trend among sailboard manufacturers, towards developing and manufacturing high-performance gear for the technically advanced sailor, windsurfing has not attracted as many new people in the past decade as it did at the beginning.
That is kind of a shame. A lot of people have been missing out on one of the most mind and body expanding experiences available today. While there's a part of me that would like to keep that a secret, so that my private coves and beaches stay that way, another part of me feels sad, remembering how much fun it was to hang out on the water, together, without any of us taking it so seriously.
Along with the excitement of then, there was also a feeling that you were on the threshold of discovering something new...like the first time you fall in love.
So, as we begin a new century and a new chapter, we can continue to be wondering where this journey of wind and water will take us.
As then, like now...
Laurie Nadel is the author of "Sixth Sense" and several other books. A former writer/producer for CBS and ABC News she has been writing about windsurfing since the mid-80's. Her autobiographical book, 'Dancing with the Wind'; will be the first in a series of ten windsurfing chronicles.
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