Teach Your Children

They were younger and very much into the boy band mania that plagued the planet. You remember the dark days, when N’Sync and the Backstreet Boys ruled the world. It was indeed a scourge, but I, like many other parents were helpless to stop it. I could control what was on the house stereo, but I didn’t even bother to try and manage what was being played behind closed doors in my daughter’s bedrooms. As with the home sound system, there were definite music rules for the family vehicles. My truck cd player was loaded with Jimmy Buffett, Grateful Dead, the Band and Jefferson Airplane heading an all-star line-up – my truck rocked! My wife’s truck on the other hand was much more democratic. She would put in a couple of her cd’s, a couple of mine, and the rest she would turn over to our daughters Dana and Stephanie. Her attitude was one of peaceful co-existance. You could listen to our daughters whine and complain or you could listen to N’Sync, choose your poison. Within the doors of my Ford Explorer though, I ruled. I didn’t have to choose my poison, I used the volume button.
So yes, my truck rocked, but none of the temples of estrogen sharing my home with me would ride in it, so my truck didn’t roll, at least with them aboard. My daughters thought the truck was haunted. Just because the windows went up and down on their own and various parts of the interior fell off for no reason, that’s no reason to think the spirit of Jerry Garcia is being channeled through my door panels. As for Linda, she just felt that it was generally unsafe and a huge risk to ride in. As such, their unanimous philosophy was to let me drive it as much as I wanted, but keep the life insurance on me high, either way, they weren’t along for any ride. That’s what brings us to the Dear Abby moment.
Since the fright factor regarding my truck was so high, we had a tendency to take Linda’s truck whenever the four of us were going somewhere. While on the surface, that decision may seem to indicate a more pleasant and smoother journey, other factors were in play. I have a road rule, when I’m driving, the music must be of a nature as to not cause me to drive off the road and into a ditch. In other words, music from N’Sync, Britney, or others of equally limited talent doesn’t get played. My kids weren’t always on board with that theory though.
As I started to pull out of our driveway one afternoon with the three girls in tow, the grating sounds of N’Sync started oozing out the speakers. Knowing it wasn’t safe to continue like that, I had my children’s safety at sake, I advanced the cd player to the next disc. Immediately, the two music critics in the back seat started displaying their displeasure…. loudly, until they realized that the next cd was the equally distracting Backstreet Boys. I hit the disc advance button again and the back seat screaming resumed. Fortunately, the next cd was Jimmy Buffett so I let it play so the trip could continue safely, if not quietly. At that point, a battle erupted between the capability of the volume button and the vocal chords of my two teenage girls. Finally, Dana loudly announced that “Jimmy Buffett sucks and twenty years from now no one will know who Jimmy Buffett is, but everyone will still be listening to N’Sync.”
I was incredulous and amused. Dana and Stephanie were also incredulous, but not so amused. Thank heaven our truck doesn’t have a volume control in the back like an earlier truck did and we rode on in relative although certainly not total harmony. Upon returning home, I decided that we may want to commemorate Dana’s comment for historical purposes. I wrote down her statement, dated it, and placed it in an envelope marked to be opened on this same day twenty years from now.
We haven’t gone twenty years yet, but we have traveled seven, enough at least to partially gauge her quote. Neither N’Sync or the Backstreet Boys made it through the next year. As for Buffett, I saw him this past winter and the concert sold out in 18 minutes. While I can’t speak for the entire world, at least the fifteen thousand singing along in the Sound Advice Amphitheatre are still listening. Case closed, no need for thirteen more years to decide this debate.
But what made me think of that afternoon seven years ago was a recent phone call from Dana who’s now attending the University of Florida. She asked me to copy some of my 60’s music files and send them up to her. Forty years after these songs were recorded, my daughter will be listening to them. Her car will rock with Quicksilver, the Dead and Hendrix. Did I put some Buffett on the disk I sent her – of course, lots. I also put a song by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, “Teach Your Children”, I wonder if she’s listened to that one.

The Surf Rat

I stopped in the Ohana Surf Shop in Stuart the other day looking for a t-shirt from the company whose surfboard I currently ride – Robert August. They don’t carry Robert August products but I ended up making a new friend. T-shirts come and go from their life in my drawers but you can never have enough friends. His name is Jordan and he and his wife Tara own the shop so he’s there most of the time (when he’s not surfing). While at this stage, renewing my supply of surf wax is pretty much the extent of my purchasing, I’ve been back to the shop several times just to talk with Jordan about surfing and politics, two of our favorite subjects. I mentioned to him I would love to get a vintage surfboard to put on the wall at my house. Especially if it could be something that I used to ride, a “da Cat”, a “Nuuhiwa Noserider”, or one of several other boards I rode when I first started surfing. Vintage boards are big business now and with one daughter draining my bank account while attending college and another planning on soon doing the same I could have some issues. One idea is that I spend thousands on a “da Cat” that’ll hang on the wall but can’t finance my daughters thru college. Then they both come back and live at home. Hmm, maybe I’ll just ask Jordan if he could find something that would be compatible with the family finances. It might be tough, but it never hurts to ask. Jordan checked around for me but couldn’t find anything in my price range until last week when I dropped by for a chat. He had a friend that had an old Keoki that was just lying around, was in good shape and would probably be available very cheap. My first comment was somewhat derisive, “it’s a pop-out”. Pop-outs were boards mass produced by machines in the sixties and not hand shaped like the more popular (and more expensive) boards. They were not held in very high esteem but they were cheap. He said he’d bring the board into the shop for me to check out, I told him if the price was in the range I thought it should be, I’d buy it.

Upon returning home, I informed my wife of my possible future purchase and also explained what a pop-out was. She told me that permission for me to hang a board on any wall other than in the garage (where my 2 current boards hang) was far from being assured and why would I want a cheap board like a Keoki. She is very familiar with names like Greg Noll, Bing Copeland and of course Miki Dora, but who or what was a Keoki.

Valid question….

When I was 12, I was attending Nova, which was a combined junior high and high school. Students from 7th grade through 12th all went to school together. I worshipped the older classmen who were surfers, a very small group in Florida in 1964. I was their gopher during lunch (hey kid, get me another milk), their gopher around school (hey kid, I left my math book in my locker, go get it for me), and even though I was much younger I sometimes would do their homework (they all weren’t Rhodes scholars). But it got me 2 things I wanted very dearly. One, was the chance to sit with them and listen to them talk about surfing. The other, which was infinitely more valuable, they would take me to the beach when they went surfing. Of course my duties at the beach were pretty much along the lines of my duties in the cafeteria or hallways of the school – that of being a gopher. The older guys would paddle out to surf and I would sit on shore and watch. If they wiped out and lost their board I would retrieve it and paddle it back out to them. This is the whole reason for my actions though, when they’d come in for a break I was allowed to take their board out to surf, well worth it for a 12 year old gremmie. One of the guys, Rick (sorry, 45 years ago and I can’t remember his last name), was particularly sympathetic to me and always made sure I got a decent amount of use on his board. The older guys liked having a personal assistant and in return, I was learning to surf.

Eventually, Rick moved on to a name surfboard and sold me his, a blue Keoki, for $25. Of course I still couldn’t drive so I remained in the servitude of my older companions for transportation to the waves, but at least now I could be out in the water the whole time alongside them. Like Rick, I moved on from my Keoki to a Greg Noll bought at the Little Hawaii Surf Shop in Hollywood (Florida!!) and my blue Keoki made it’s way to parts unknown.

It’s been decades since I felt wax rubbed across the Keoki label underneath my feet. While my current board is the same size, it’s a quarter of the weight, has a 3 fin removable system, a concave nose, a 60\40 rail design and so on. My original Keoki, was a big hunk of cheap fiberglass covered foam with no design to it. But, it was the first thing that allowed me to walk on water and I’ve never forgotten those afternoons with Rick along with my other upperclass masters. The board Jordan found is red, not blue, but it’s a Keoki, my first board. Since none of my friends surf, I’ve been thinking, would anyone know the difference between a David Nuuhiwa or a Keoki, probably not. I would, but suddenly it seems ok.