The Legacy
Origins of
The Surfing Lesson
Succinct, Spare, Direct, & Remarkable; Discover The Original Short Story That Intrigued & Entertained Readers Around The World.
Literally hundreds of other publications and sports magazines owed a considerable debt of gratitude to Surfer Magazine as being the original godfather of action sports publications that, along with Sports Illustrated and certain skiing & automotive magazines, literally governed the imaginations of popular American sports culture for over half of the 20th century.
History, Overview
& Complete Text
Two Scenes - Printed On Three Pages
The short story The Surfing Lesson was originally published in Surfer Magazine in late 1994, appearing in the issue with January 1995 on the cover. Over four years the author published a half dozen short stories in Surfer Magazine using a pen name, and believes that The Surfing Lesson was published in the issue Volume 35 # 1.
The author’s first piece in Surfer Magazine was an illustrated environmental science study, published in 1971.
The legacy of Surfer Magazine still carries extraordinary significance in the world of action sports and beach culture.
Founded in 1959 by John Severson in Capistrano Beach California, Surfer Magazine was in print for nearly 60 years. It was the groundbreaking original sports publication of its kind, and at the time it first arrived on newsstands it was the most expensive magazine in America – at $0.75 a copy.
Originally starting as a graphic flyer to promote live screenings of Severson’s surf films, ‘The Surfer’ went from being a promotional magazine published Quarterly to a Bi-Monthly, and then with skyrocketing demand became a Monthly publication after the second year.
Surfer Magazine was a powerhouse of international cultural & fashion influence, and in the late 1970s, at the time of its sale by the founding editor, there were over 100,000 active subscribers around the world. Surfer magazine was read on every major continent and was the defacto bible of the sport.
The magazine instantly became the primary media source for a sport that eventually evolved into a multibillion-dollar international industry with millions of active surfers around the world. As of 2021 Surfing is now an Olympic sport.
Surfer Magazine’s founding editor John Severson was an extremely talented filmmaker, writer, typographer & graphic designer – as well as a fine art painter. Early on Surfer magazine establish a tradition of being exceptionally original in its visual design, and from its inception included short stories as a regular feature of the publication.
Readers of Surfer Magazine were more than just casual observers of media. The early magazines were hoarded as collector’s items and read by surf obsessed fans who would repeatedly re-read & study every single word in every issue. For the first 30 years, each new issue was treated as an event.
In the pre-digital era Surfer was the number one forum for worldwide beach culture news, humor, travel inspiration, imaginative fashion, and product innovation.
Stories published in Surfer Magazine were read, shared, and heavily discussed in Australia, Africa France & The UK, as well as throughout the United States, Latin America, Asia, and the Pacific.
The magazine was eventually sold, and then changed hands multiple times before finally closing shop in October 2020.
Below Is The Transcribed Text Of The Complete Original Short Story.
This Transcript Is Formatted Into Two Contiguous Scrollable Columns – Simply To Save Page Space & Offer Ease Of Access. Enjoy!
The Surfing Lesson
Today was hats. At the beach it was always wild and colorful hats. When they went surfing, Rachel left her blonde wig at the house. Surfing the cold ranch waves she’d wear her O’Neill hood with her bright turquoise fullsuit.
But on the beach, it was hats. Edward had fashioned straps for them to keep the persistent Point Conception winds from snatching them off her head and sending him bouncing down the beach. Once, her expensive cowboy hat had blown off the blufftop lookout at Auggie’s. Right into the surf. After that he started working on the straps.
Sheltered from the snappy offshores, was plenty hot under the crumbling bluffs. Today the surf wasn’t that great. Not like last week. Then Edward had watched his young wife ride six-foot ruler edged Big Drakes with the speed and grace of a soaring pelican. But not today. That was fine. Rachel was feeling off today. They were happy to be alone with the three foot peaks at Lefts and Rights.
When the tide dropped, so did the waves. They came in, got out of their wetsuits and Rachel unpacked their lunch. After, they decided to build a sand castle. It was Rachel’s idea of course. Rachel built one side, Edward the other.
Edward hadn’t built a sand castle and at least 45 years. He was 58 years old. Rachel had been his wife for 14 months. A reasonably talented painter, a former waitress and a naturally attractive surfer, Rachel was 24.
She was too poor to be a patient at his clinic: they met at a therapy group his partner had organized at Cedars Sinai hospital. He begrudgingly filled in for one night. Rachel, by chance, went for one night. Such is fate. She offered to give Edward a surfing lesson.
The sun had turned the Santa Barbara Channel into a hammered mirror of 10 billion silver shards. The black silhouettes of the Channel Islands hung like ghost ships on the horizon.
With her flamboyant red beret resting on his shoulder, they watched the kelp encrusted incoming tide eat at the castle. Seagulls squawked at nothing, hovering. Edwards part of the castle stood the longest. It’s solid ramparts had the attention to form in exacting detail that only the hand of a surgeon could create. Rachel’s parts consisted of random pinnacles. The filigree of tears, piled drip by drip, like a giant confectionery web woven by a spider on magic mushrooms – a fantastic yet fragile construction.
Raised in a big and busy eastern city, Edward had never known a place of peace such as this. Thrust into the Pacific Ocean, they were alone with the great wilderness and these empty miles of Hollister Ranch coastline. He had bought the ranchland for her as a wedding present. It was her colorful descriptions of the beauty and freedom of surfing that had first attracted him to her. Edgar was sure her passion for riding waves gave her the strength to live.
The sun set. It was magnificent. Flaming tangerine and gold. It was Rachel who had taught him to watch sunsets. He had never given it much notice before. How different Rachel was from his late wife. She had been a woman of immense pride and vanity, a domineering social climber. Miserable really, their country club world. She and their country club friends knew little about life. They played golf, drank. Unhappy in their wealth, their souls were tragically empty.
It took someone who loved the ocean to open Edwards jaded and weary eyes. Someone who looked at the world with the eyes of an artist. Someone who surfed! Thank God for her illness, he had often told her, for it had brought them together. Ironically, she had cured the doctor before he had cured her.
The winding road into the lumpy hills snaked through narrow canyons crammed with oaks. The trees crowded the road as if leaning over in curiosity, looking to see who drove by.
Edward slowed to a rolling stop as a group of deer across the canyon. A thought about how pissed off his family had been when he married Rachel. A ‘gold digger’ they called her. They labeled him an old fool, sent letters saying, “You’re being cruelly deceived”.
For their honeymoon, he and Rachel had gone on a surfing world tour. Meanwhile, the house at the ranch was being built.
He stopped as the deer passed. They crossed the canyon as gracefully as Rachel surfed, with no thought beyond the moment at hand. Sleeping when they were tired, eating when they were hungry, owning nothing, and needing little. So simple. Edward knew that unlike humans animals didn’t get cancer. He guessed this was because they lived totally in the present, never stressed over some imaginary world.
TSL Cont.
The deer disappeared into the canyon. Rachel had fallen asleep. He drove on, thinking how glad he was that he had sold his medical practice. Just dropped out. He did miss the high seven-figure income, but his family fortune eclipsed that paltry sum.
He’d always been rich. But it wasn’t until he met a very sick, nearly destitute, and very brave young surfer that he began to understand the real value of anything. He was becoming more like the deer. He had even started to surf. At his age! Still strong and healthy, he loved it.
Rachel had found him a classic Yater balsa longboard, nearly half his age and in perfect condition. It rode steady and solid, and on it he had discovered the meaning of Stoke.
Sequestered deep in the canyons on a high vertical ridge, the amber glow of the house lights whispered ‘home’. Arriving, Edward parked the car. Rachel was surfed out. It had been one of the harder days for her. She was still asleep as Edward bundled her up and carried her into the house.
Rachel awoke as he carried her into the bedroom. “Your Sandcastle was what much better than mine”, she said to him.
“Like hell it was”, Edward replied. He set her on the bed. “Look at me”, he said, and she did. “Your castle was far more beautiful than mine, and you surf better than I ever will”.
“Don’t worry”, she said, “I’ve been watching you. With your stoke, you’ll be ripping with the best of them. One year, I promise”. With that she drifted off to sleep again.
That night, in their bedroom, months earlier than expected, Rachel began to die. Her pulse cords were fluttering under his fingertips. Her temperature swung wildly, and she slipped into an incoherent trance. She kicked away the down comforter. Edward recognized all the symptoms. Little could be done, and he knew it. He was the doctor.
Despite being in a semi-coma, she suddenly shouted out. Something about taking his balsa board off the car. And to listen to the wind. Talking as if from another world, Rachel told him a green glass temple was his for the asking. Just to ride, ride, ride. Then in a tone as normal and as common as could be, she said that she could never make sandcastles as good as his. That was the last thing she ever said.
At the telephone, Edward had a clear view of the coast. The beach far below was a long thin crescent, arcing blue in the pale moonlight as it swept towards the dark headlands beyond.
He wanted to drink a beer and lie in the sun with Rachel. He want to surf with her once more. He wanted to tell her from the greater perspective she had given him, that his overlooking the beauty of simple things was something he would never do.
And as far as sandcastles were concerned, he needed to tell her this: that owning a talent like his had been, up to before they met, and awkward, difficult thing. That it meant expecting too much, being overwhelmed most of the time, and liking yourself too little to notice the simple stoke in life.
He wanted to be able to assure her: now that she’d given him the lesson of surfing, that it would never be like that again.
Finis
Word Count 1363
All Story Content Copyright 1994-2026 Richard Arthur Love
The First Surfer Magazine Ever – 1959
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