Raising A Soul Surfer by Rick Bundschuh, Cheri Hamilton Page B

Bible School so they could have a few hours on the sand without us.
    Once we were all in school, my mom went to night school and took classes to complete her teaching credential. This allowedmy mom and dad to share vacation times with the family. I also remember that they would use us as guinea pigs for all the different kinds of educational and intelligence tests their schools were experimenting with.
    Please don’t get the impression that I was a dainty china doll. Sure, we had music lessons (piano lessons, and I even played violin in the school orchestra), and we played dress-up; but Dad made us do yard work with push mowers, and my sisters and I rode bikes, played kickball, explored canyons and romped all over half a dozen beaches. Surfing wasn’t on my horizon yet, but I can only imagine that many people viewed it as just another fad that would fade away. Playing with jacks would be all the rage when, suddenly, for no particular reason, hopscotch took over to be followed by marbles and then foursquare.
    Our whole family was the outdoorsy type. Dad would load us all up with the tent in our station wagon (the minivan of the time), and we’d spend summer vacations camping along the Pacific coastline, all the way north into Oregon.
    My dad was a hard-working guy, always having to be doing something. He worked a side job at a local hotel; and on top of that, he attended college for his master’s degree. He’d decorate the yard with tiki torches and turned our front porch into a tropical garden. He also bought beat-up homes near the beach, and we would spend weekends helping to fix them up for resale. Then my sisters and I could take our canvas air-mattress rafts and play around in the ocean.
    The beaches became our new playground as we fine-tuned our water skills on rubber rafts, riding waves all summer long. My parents soon found their favorite beach at La Jolla Cove. It was a snorkeling wonderland. We swam alongside my dad as we held our spears in readiness. I don’t remember ever catching a fish by myself, because I couldn’t bear the thought of killing one.We learned to get abalone and let my dad get the lobsters. It was painful to watch them die as they were dropped into the boiling water when we returned home for dinner.
    The Gidget scene (remember those beach movies?) was exploding in Los Angeles. Our cousins, who lived in West Covina, were very aware of this latest surfing craze. My mom’s brother, who was an officer for the LAPD (Los Angeles Police Department), had four daughters. His oldest daughter, Kathy, was now sweet 16, and she decided that she wanted to try surfing. She figured that as soon as her family planned a visit to her water-immersed cousins down in San Diego, she would plan a surf venture.
    My sister Debbie and I agreed to rent two boards and give surfing a try. My mom dropped us off at the Gordon and Smith Surf Shop in Mission Beach, a tiny hole in the wall, and we rented two boards for 50 cents each per hour. With the sidewalk baking our feet, we three girls took turns doubling up, carrying the heavy surfboards for a 20-minute walk up Mission Beach Drive to the designated surf zone. That left 20 minutes to surf before we had to walk back another 20 minutes to the surf shop, completing our one-hour rental.
    Debbie and Kathy rode their first waves as I watched from the shore. Then, at last, it was my turn. I took hold of the board and pushed it out just inside the main middle breaking section of waves. I knew I didn’t have much time left before we had to return, so I just went for it and took off on a little ankle snapper wave barely six inches high. When I reached the shore, I was told it was time to go back; so taking turns carrying the heavy boards, we walked back silently, inwardly focused on our thrilling adventure. I was so elated! Although I had only caught one tiny wave, I knew even then that this was all I ever wanted to do. All of my other goals in life disappeared: all of my