Searching for Buoys

I’m out the door just a little before 9:00 and the morning marine layer is burning off nicely. I’m hoping for a sunny swim, but we’ll just have to see what happens. I park next to someone who is sleeping in their car. If you are going to sleep in your car, this is the place to do it. There is a slight breeze in the air here and just a little texture from what I can see on the water.

I know the water will be comfy today as it has been the last several swims. All of the southern buoys are reporting 70 degrees and San Pedro is at 68. I am thinking of these buoys as I walk to the stairs and it makes me sad to know that my dad will not be reading these numbers. He loved these simple facts. If you asked him what and when the day’s high and low tides would be, he could probably tell you. Are you curious just what the annual property tax is on one of the houses/castles on the strand? You could have asked my dad. The answer is likely higher than your annual mortgage.

It’s low tide on the beach and there is plenty of sand. The sand completely covers the last small set of steps that run along the side of the ramp and the big 5 foot Jupiter rock is submerged up to it’s last couple feet. Walking down the stairs, I was looking for the “Death Star” buoy. Apparently this is a buoy put out by the jr. guards that is the furthest off shore. Last year it was the “North Star” and in previous years before that it was the “Green Monster.” I have not yes seen the Death Star. This causes me some amount of frustration. I think I have seen it once from the stairs way way out there - further out than I have ever seen a jr. guard buoy. It was a smooth, glassy morning when I saw it. I wonder if any amount of texture on the water will hide it. I look and look and I just see the usual buoys I have swam past already. There are a couple I see and I wonder if just maybe I have not swam past them before. I can’t tell from here.

So as I head out into the water, I’m going to head due west right for those buoys and check things out. I plan to head north today but aim more west to intersect with the buoys first. I eventually reach one and it is the unmarked super bright and new buoy that I think was put out by the lifeguards. I can see another one just 30 feet farther out and when I reach it I am disappointed - Big Bertha. Oh. Yup. Been here done that. These are just the same old buoys. Where is that death star? I gaze out into the the distance and see nothing. Don’t get me wrong. This is all beautiful and amazing and you should swim out here to see it for yourself. Ok. Enough buoy circumnavigation. Let’s head for the Monarch Bay Beach Club. Ahhhh it’s so great out here. The sun is shining. Still plenty of cloud cover to my immediate west. I am right on the edge of this hazy grey mass.

I put my focus on my breath. I skipped my morning meditation today after sleeping in today to 7:30 because I was up until midnight finishing up yesterday’s photo editing for yesterday’s swim post. I have lots I want to get done today so why not kill two birds with one stone and double up swim time and meditation time? I realize that does not exactly exemplify the meditative, mindful spirit. However, swim time, whether it is my explicit intention or not, is always meditation time. What else am I doing out here? Ok, other than searching for buoys.

I feel a tension inside the inner walls of my thoughts. I try to settle into my breath but feel my thoughts going everywhere. Then I realize how I am trying to force my thoughts to calm down. Trust me, it doesn’t work. I should know. I’ve been trying it for decades without success. Maybe today will be different? Not likely, so I try to let my mind go ahead and dream. Just let these fleeting thoughts come and go and watch them like a good movie. Where will this thought go? And what new thought will come next? There are feelings that accompany these thoughts. It’s all a mish mash collage of images and memory and fears and hopes and frustrations and regrets and yearnings and de ja vu sensations.

I keep swimming north. Just how far will I swim? I don’t want to stop. I wish I could just keep going to Three Arch Bay or Thousand Steps but I just can’t spend that much time. I get to the beach club where I would normally turn around and just keep going. I go all the way to the end of Monarch - just short of the tiny piece of beach that sits on its northern edge, inaccessible by foot from Salt Creek. One of these days I want to actually swim to the beach but the tide is too low with too much surf today. Still I am pretty darn close and the entire ridge line here is beautiful. It’s usually seen from quite a distance, but here I am just beneath it. I love it.

Well unless I pivot, I really can’t go much farther so now is just a good enough time as any to turn around. I hug the edge of the bay and head largely east until I am quite close to shore at the end of Salt Creek. I continue along the beach club that I am usually a good hundred yards at least offshore from but now it is so close. I get to the northern Salt Creek bathrooms and the next portable lifeguard tower. I can see that I am approaching the primary surf breaks and am going to need to veer offshore soon.

Looking south, things have gotten hazier here and less crisp and sunny than they were at the start of the swim. This entire stretch of shoreline lies in a soft light mist but I’m sure it is totally sunny as close as the parking lot. Time is moving quickly over the entire swim. I have no sense of “when will we be done?” I am content to just wander out here and get there when I get there. When I reach the surf pack, I am practically swimming in between the surfers. I try to put just a little distance between us so that when the next set of waves roll in, I am past the break. My camera housing is fogging up and I very carefully take my camera out to get some cleaner shots and then put it back in. If I drop it, the camera is gone.

I continue south past the Ritz and eventually to shore and then walk back up the stairs as I bask in the glow of the water I just left behind. When I reach my car, the guy parked next to me is still sleeping but has moved from the passenger to the driver seat. I create stories in my head about his “life circumstances.” I can tell by his car that he is not a “man of means.” Maybe he lives a life where he has to sleep during the day and lives some kind of odd clandestine lifestyle at night. I have absolutely no idea but I send him thoughts of well being.