I left the house at 7:00 today. It’s a holiday in India so I am light on meetings this morning. It’s overcast skies and a pleasant 66 degrees in the air.

I pass Doheny and the water looks nice enough. The wind is stronger than normal today but the ocean surface looks clean. There are about 20 surfers who are probably thinking the same and sitting out there waiting for waves.

I arrive at the parking lot and things look kind of misty from the marine layer and very peaceful.

As I walk down the stairs, I am just a few feet behind the morning swim crew. There are about 6 of them walking down in pairs and engaged in their own conversation. The two in front of me are talking about the book Endurance about the harrowing journey of Ernest Shackleton and his crew. I have not read that book but have seen a few documentaries (Nova has a really good one) and it is quite the story.

We get to the beach and it’s a welcome sight as usual. I feel the water and it still feels good. It has lost a few degrees over the past 24 hours from a steady northwest wind. Surfline gives a 67 degree water temperature reading and the local buoys are all down to 69 to 71. This is fine. I’ll take 67 degrees any day.

I get in the water and start swimming out just as a set of waves is starting to roll in. I breach the first one before it breaks and then slide over the next couple.

The water definitely feels a bit cooler today but I have no complaints. It feels good. It went from really warm to warm - not bad. It feels pretty great to be out here.

I’m heading south and it feels like I am moving with the current. It’s not strong but I can feel a slight push coming from behind. I can feel the waves every few minutes heading east and pushing themselves beneath me. They lift me up and then I gently glide down their backs.

It seems like I make it to the south end of the beach pretty quickly. I miss those southern buoys. They are good company out here but I also enjoy the solitude.

As usual it is quiet. Even when the beach is crowded (which it is not right now), it is silent out here. The only sounds are usually just the waves breaking inside and the birds chirping above which is pretty darn nice background ambience. Every once in a while there is the odd bit of construction noise or a boat or jet ski engine. The worst are those para sailor things. I don’t know what they are called exactly but they support a human via a parachute like canopy and are propelled by what looks like a large fan just behind the sailor. They are super loud. I don’t see them that often though.

I’ve been reading a book by Natalie Goldberg who is a Zen practitioner and author (obviously). She believes in writing as a spiritual practice, which is how I often perceive writing as well. There is something about her voice that I really appreciate. She has this way of just spinning these stories from her personal life that kind of just gently roll over you and sort of push you through the narrative of her own life in such a way that puts you in touch with the narrative of your own. Listening to her books is like taking a nice drive down Pacific Coast Highway.

I’m heading north now and just moving forward and I look up and move forward some more and then look up again. That Salt Creek lifeguard tower isn’t going anywhere. I can hear Ms. Goldberg in the back of my head. This is all I need to do. Just move forward and feel every detail of this swim and the water against my body.

I want to find every ripple and every wake in front of me. They rise and disappear and then become different ripples and wakes that hold only a memory of the ripples and wakes they were before.

I look for every shadow and every reflection of what little light is out right now. The shadows dance and jump and cannot seem to stay in one place. Then a bird flies right in my line of sight along the horizon. I stop to look and it is gone as quickly as it came.

It’s time to turn around again and finish off the last 10 minutes of this swim. Like Sunday, today’s swim feels like it flew by.

I pass the one remaining buoy that has been left by the jr. guard operation. Will it remain until next summer? Can it survive the winter swells? Last year’s buoy was not so lucky, but last year was an anomaly.

Soon I am upright once again on the beach. The sky is still overcast but it has a definite blue tint and the air has a growing warmth that makes one feel like the sun might not be long in coming. By the time I get to my car, it already has a sort of sunny disposition.