Beau Midgett
Emmitt Waves
I’m frequently asked to repeat my version of Emmitt’s departure, especially over beach bonfires. I don’t mind, a good surf tale never grows old. Although they’ve heard it all before, I think my friends are looking for some clue we missed or they want a prompting about paddling to catch happiness before it rolls on by forever; the way Emmitt did.
All surfers upon this watery world love perfect waves; however, wave-riders here on the Outer Banks of North Carolina heed our infrequent perfect waves with extra reverence. Those waves are Emmitt. Elsewhere terms like glassy, strong, and curling are employed in describing an exceptional wave: Outer Banks surfers use the Emmitt scale. We often describe a day’s or even a tide’s waves as head high and half Emmitt or shoulder high and almost Emmitt. Only the most totally awesome waves are honored with the full Emmitt rating. My description of an Emmitt wave is a liquid deity rising from the ocean after rolling in from heaven with the large curl generating a smooth roaring that beckons to surfers like Sirens of the sea. The adoption of the Emmitt rating was a natural occurrence everyone accepted without remembering when it was started or by who.
People, like me, who were raised with beach sand in our diapers, the oily smell of sun-block lotion in our noses, and a perpetual taste of salt in our mouths from spending day after summer day on the seashore, gravitate toward waves like the seawater forced up on the shoreline. Emmitt was not one of us. He saw the ocean for the first time at fourteen when his parents moved from somewhere far inland. Yet Emmitt felt that pull, that undertow of the waves greater than I ever had.
Our Emmitt worshipped a great wave generating swell as a religion with compulsory attendance. He was always, always there. Please understand, the green rolling hills of liquid pleasure were much more than a desire to him, they were a necessity. Because the surf legend Emmitt, despite wave-riding every chance he had from being introduced to waves in high school, was the worst surfer to ever climb on a shaped board with fins. Maybe he was slightly better than a beginner -- maybe. When perched upon his surfboard with his arms flapping to maintain balance, Emmitt looked as natural as a sea turtle sliding down a mountainside. Walk into any Surf-shop or bar catering to Outer Banks surfers and you’ll see at least one displayed photo of an Emmitt royal nosedive or an Emmitt radical flip off; that is if the place is legit and not another tourist trap.
The wipeouts, although spectacular, were merely a fraction of Emmitt’s stature, as that was forged on the scarce exceptional waves; because only a flawless wave could our hero manage to catch and ride. But after those sparse occasions, he would describe his bliss by calling the humming of his surfboard’s fins catching air while cutting through the face of a wave as the sound of angels singing from Heaven. And despite hearing few angelic choruses, his excitement endured.
Skilled surfers will often treat beginning or no talent surfers as nuisances getting in their way on the better and busier shore-breaks. Emmitt, however, was invited and welcomed on the best shore-breaks by the best surfers. Everyone tried helping him too, but instructions seemed to cause minuscule or no improvement.
One summer Charlie, a gifted local pro who saw himself as a Surf Zen Master, procured Emmitt as a pupil. Charlie recognized enhancing Emmitt’s wave riding as a greater challenge than any surfing championship. One of the many things he tried was to have Emmitt balancing on one foot while watching the waves from the shore. It reminded everybody of the beach scene from The Karate Kid. It seemed foolish to me, since Emmitt did a lot of his struggling to maintain balance surfing on one foot anyway. Charlie kept trying though. We appreciated his effort.
But soon the master recognized the mission was totally unattainable.
“I don’t get it, dude,” Charlie said. “Brad, dude, I showed him all I know -- and nothing, nada. The dude is near clueless -- I’m feeling clueless, dude.”
The previously tranquil Charlie became so disturbed and so stressed, a group of friends organized an intervention. I called it an intervention; it was surfers sitting on the beach during a full moon night, drinking red-stripe beer, and discussing Emmitt. When the last beer disappeared from the cooler, Charlie and the rest of us finally decided to accept Emmitt’s surf deficiency. I said, “A crab was a crab, Emmitt was Emmitt, and that was that.” It was weak saying, but sounding good to a bunch of drunken surfers, it caught on.
Now despite being surfing impaired, Emmitt was tall, dark, and handsome and possessed the God given ability in the trivial mathematics. He helped me and other sun browned surfing teens earn better grades in useless subjects like high school algebra. Deservingly, Emmitt won a scholarship to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Then even with hustling the four hours back to the beach when great surf materialized, he graduated with an accounting degree at the top of his class in three years.
After college, Emmitt accepted a job with a Nags Head CPA firm on the Outer banks. They were so glad to have Emmitt, they allowed him to come and go as he and the waves pleased. The firm’s gray haired owner understood; if big fish were blitzing nearby, you could forget about reaching him either. For several years Emmitt seemed happy, especially after his college girlfriend, Alice, moved in with him.
Then one August day, a twenty seven year old Emmitt ascended from a hero to a legend.
On that warm clear day, the most gorgeous swells, generated from a distant tropical
storm named Emmitt, appropriately, finished their journeying across the Atlantic beside
the black and white spirals of the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse. We surfers delighted in spending the day capitalizing on the waves’s spectacular finales. The day was almost perfect, but lacked Emmitt.
That evening when dark drove us from the water, we grouped on the beach to recap our joy and discuss Emmitt’s absence. Several people, including myself, had left messages on his answering machine the previous night about the potential of the growing seas. I speculated Alice had deleted the messages; the shrew had before. But Emmitt’s closest friend, Tim, explained Alice had dumped our Emmitt the week before, and he had started acting strange.
“Acting strange is one thing,” I said. “But missing great surf was madness.” I was worried. I rattled some rust off my puttering little truck to see Emmitt.
Meanwhile the other surfers commenced planning a huge party celebrating the witch’s departure, an event the entire beach community would honor, except possibly Emmitt. They were not worried about Emmitt since he would soon be flooded with numerous female volunteers to replace Alice. There was some justifiable fear from some surfers that their girlfriends would be all too eager to take advantage of Emmitt’s availability.
Pulling into the driveway of Emmitt’s rented beach-box house, I saw many glowing house lights, but his car missing. Despite picking Emmitt up several times for surfing, I had never seen the inside his house; Alice had always been there. On the few misguided occasions I had spoken with her to be polite, I felt crappy for the remainder of the day. An old hippie surfer said, “Alice possessed a dark karma and channeled bad vibes.” I had never believed in such before I met Alice.
Two fears gripped me while climbing the cottage stairs: Emmitt had done harm to himself, or Alice had returned. As I knocked on the door with my heart pounding, I prayed -- please God, don’t let Alice answer. That seems selfish now, but only to those who never met Alice.
“It’s open,” Emmitt hollered from the back bedroom.
I opened the door and was shocked to see a living room littered with surfing magazines scattered wall to wall on a green shag carpet. It was crazy to have such a sand collecting rug, I thought.
“Man, am I glad to see you,” Emmitt said, emerging from the bedroom with a suitcase in each hand and an energized look in his brown eyes. “I’ve been trying to call Tim, you, or anybody all day.”
“We were surfing,” I said. “You missed some awesome waves, dude.”
“I need a ride to the Norfolk Airport.”
“Airport? Where’s your car?”
“Sold it.” Emmitt pointed at his surfboard behind the front door. “Grab my board and
let’s go.”
Following him down the steps, I noticed a crumpled magazine
smashed in Emmitt’s right hand. After tossing his bags into the back of my truck, Emmitt stopped and gazed at the magazine before climbing inside.
Emmitt explained everything during the two hour ride. It all began with him proposing marriage to Alice and her counter proposing a crazy ultimatum: give up surfing or her. He admitted, to my astonishment, horror, and disbelief, he had loved Alice more than surfing; until she made him choose. From the first time Emmitt met Alice at college, he was captivated by her energy and drive. After graduating, when Emmitt turned down several lucrative employment offers to return to the beach, Alice supposedly understood. She thought Emmitt would grow out of surfing, while he thought she would grow to love the beach. Instead sand, salt, and sun apparently became toxic to her. She firmly believed that we, beach people, held Emmitt back.
Alice packed and escaped. Emmitt knew she had expected him to stop her, but she had crossed one of those lines with her ultimatum where there is no return. Emmitt cried for a day and sleepless night, but with the rising sun he welcomed an unexpected lightness of heart. He raided his attic for surfing magazines saved since high school, and rediscovered the article he feared a dream. Watching his friends disappear on winter pilgrimages to surfing paradises like Hawaii or Fiji planted an adventure in Emmitt’s mind. He had never been able to go before, at first because of school, and then Alice. Now with Alice gone, Emmitt was embarking on a surf quest. He quit his job, sold his car, and booked flights beginning in Norfolk and ending in Brazil for that night.
Once Emmitt checked in at the airport, we settled in the main section of the terminal.
Many travelers took notice of me sitting in my swimming trunks with bushy sun bleached
hair and a surfboard at my feet. I had feared some overstressed yuppie returning from some
useless business trip might be tempted to steal my board if it was in my truck’s open bed.
While waiting for Emmitt’s plane to board, I inspected the article haunting Emmitt.
According to the story: Just off Brazil’s coast the narrow Pinnacle Island’s
gradually shoaling coastline produced long lasting and curling waves
regardless the swell’s size or origination. Perfect waves persisted most of the time.
“If this place is for real, why haven’t I heard about it?” I asked, doubting its existence.
“I don’t know, but I need to look -- I need to see.” Emmitt grabbed the magazine and stared at the story’s cover picture of a head high green wave with a smooth curl.
“Yeah, but what about someplace wave definite like Hawaii or Costa Rica?”
“Nope, I’m tired of being in the way. There’s a guilt in hampering others happiness I’ve burdened too long.” Emmitt looked at the gate and took a big breath of air. A content smile rested across his face. “I’m going and if it not there I’m going to keep going until I find what I’m looking for, and I’m not coming back.”
I hugged him, wished him luck, and begged him to write more than once. I wanted to follow him. He walked off, never looking back.
Later, upon insistence from friends, I repeated the departure story many times, but I always omitted the part about Emmitt loving Alice more than surfing. I refused to tarnish a legend.
Time passed and speculation grew over what happened to Emmitt. Some people who didn’t know Emmitt well believed he chickened out and never made it. Others speculated that he was killed by Brazilian drug lords or hostile natives. One rumor surfaced about him being eaten by a shark. A few female surfers and girlfriends contemplated Emmitt faked leaving for Brazil and actually crawled back to Alice. Blasphemy! I and every other merciful male preferred the shark ending to that, anything but Alice. Most people, including myself, hoped Emmitt found it, but was sworn into secrecy by the Brazilian locals. Nothing was ever confirmed or denied.
Everybody missed Emmitt. I missed him terribly. Some fools made futile attempts to replace Emmitt by welcoming other eager beginners into the better surf breaks, but they either improved or quit. Emmitt proved irreplaceable. Tim stopped surfing and moved inland.
Years passed and younger surfers took a larger command of the waves. Most of us older surfers cut back on surfing as we looked for dry land contentment and utopias. I was blessed to find my Pinnacle Island in my wife’s love and our son and daughter’s laughter. Both are delights I find a pleasure to keep paddling for.
Only now as I sprout gray hairs, a new wisdom emerges within and images of Emmitt appear. I delight in seeing Emmitt’s spirit living in forty year old right fielders batting ninth in the softball leagues, hoping to slam the next pitch over the fence, or in the determination of my unpublished novelist friend tapping out millions of words and collecting rejections like badges of honor, while still wishing someday someone will pay him for his scribbling.
While never improving, these souls endeavor, motivated by a love few understand or appreciate. They are unique. They are Emmitt.
©2009 by Beau Midgett
