Masterclass

I’m leaving a little before 7:30 this morning. The sky is completely overcast. This is one of those days where I just have to let my auto pilot do its job to get me to the beach because my heart is not into getting wet right now. I can walk to my car. I can definitely do that and then the rest will take care of itself.

When I looked at the buoy data this morning, one of the Camp Pendleton buoys reported water temperature at 65 but San Pedro is reporting 58. Fifty what?! Ok. So I guess I can expect anything between 65 and 58, which basically translates to: I have no idea what to expect.

When I get to the parking lot I can’t really make out the detail of the surface of the ocean. I broke yet another pair of glasses and my new ones are not due for another couple days. I used to be able to go years on a single pair until I had a high energy toddler. I’ve probably gone through 5 or 6 in the last 18 months. However in his defense I know of at least 2 of those pairs were destroyed by me. Fortunately I get them online and can easily hit the “reorder” button and they don’t cost a fortune. I get them 2 pairs at a time.

I get out of the car and immediately feel the offshore breeze. Oh man lets just get through this. When I reach the sand I must say that everything looks super nice. No surprise there really. Totally different scene than my last swim on Saturday. Total cloud coverage today and the water is much more calm. So while the scenery is far less dramatic and “interesting,” it does have a soothing quality to it.

Sand has made a comeback since Saturday and the first foot of the ramp is covered. The tide is very low and someone has made some rock stacking art right here next to the lifeguard hut. I walk down to the water and get my feet wet. I can’t really tell if the temp is higher or lower than Saturday. It’s not warm but not icy cold either.

There is a guy fishing in the ankle deep water about 20 feet shy of my takeoff spot. I head on out into the paltry surf. I lean forward and swim. Oof. Cold. Ok maybe it’s not 58 but I’m thinking to myself, will I be able to maintain here? It just takes a couple minutes and things settle into an equilibrium that feels a little biased toward the cold but sustainable.

I am amazed by this feeling. It’s one of those sensations that you can never recall with complete accuracy. So to be actually in it feels like some sort of masterclass in tactile phenomenon. By the way, what is up with “master classes?” Everyone now seems to have a master class. If everyone’s class is a master class, can there really be masters? Anyways, I really try to pay attention to what it is that I am feeling because I know there will be no proper recollection possible once I am out.

It’s this feeling of cold - of being encased in cold. The cold touches every inch of my body. It’s more subtle than dipping your hands in ice water. Because there is no part of the body that is protected from the cold, there is no contrasting sensation to inform the colder parts of just how much colder they are. Over the course of the swim, I move from colder to not so bad to colder again. This happens pretty frequently today. Yeah, like I was musing about earlier, I really do think the temperature is 58-65 here. The colder areas - one is down at the southern end - have an electric intensity to them. Once you enter them, there is no escape, you simply have to remain here for as long as the cold persists and it’s going to persist for as long as it persists.

I keep swimming. The water is cleaner today than Saturday. There is still some lingering red tide in many spots but lots of lovely teal blue patches as well. Lots of kelp. Waving furry tentacles here and large tufts of floating leafy vines there. The latter can be a challenge to swim through sometimes. I try to navigate around and in between but there are spots where I find myself surrounded and I have to use both hands to push down the vines and scute my way over bit by bit.

It’s definitely more of a Cormorant than Pelican day today. It’s not Pelican free (thank goodness) but lots of random Cormorant fly bys. Their flight patterns tend to be much more erratic and their wings flap rapidly. One flies over me so close I can hear the sound of its wings moving the air around them like breath.

Today is one of those days where the grey is all pervasive. It is everywhere. It is both above and below the water’s edge. I’m trying to hang on to that edge. It’s a partition I know but I can’t tell what is separated from what. Nor do I want to know right now. I am absorbed by the distortion and mixing of air and water as it reacts with the vapor inside my mind. It becomes a point of view with no subject or object. The nouns fall away and yield to verbs.

I watch the bubbles caused by my exhales. For a while the sound seems to overwhelm everything else. Then I pause and there is silence and the gentle sound of inshore waves and some random squawking of birds that I cannot see. When I reach my northern turn around at the border of Salt Creek, I can hear the muffled voices of the surf pack. They sound excited but I can’t make out actual words.

I’m finishing up and this last bit feels particularly cold. Who can I talk to and inform that June is less than a week away? I’m concerned that the ocean has forgotten.

I’m done and head up the stairs. Both Saturday and today have made for cold ascensions. My breathing is deep and controlled. My shiver response is particularly strong. This is May right?