Golden Girls

The alarm rang at 4:30 am, but I was already awake. Meeting Surf Sisters Sherri and Haley at 5:15 for the hour drive up to El Porto in Manhattan Beach for the Queen of the South Bay celebration of surfing, I didn't want to be late. Haley's 8-foot longboard fit neatly inside my upside down 9 on her roof rack. She had purchased new straps for the trip to hold our boards atop Rustica, her dark orange Subaru. Her shortboards were inside the car; Haley was competing in both sides of the competition: long and short. She did 7 heats that day, eventually claiming 5th place overall in the longboard Shredding Betties age group. I am in awe of her. I barely survived my one heat. Sherri was there to cheer us on; she didn't want to participate. Sherri said she would need to get better at surfing before she could compete; that she would need to get better on her hardboard, she didn't want to ride her foamie in a competition. I do not have these concerns. I am ride or die with the Admiral, still, after all of these years. I was there to have a beautiful day hanging out with two women I love. The surfing was secondary.

QOTSB organizers do not call it a competition. They refer to us as participants. It's a celebration more than a competition. My goal for the day, in the Golden Girls category, 55+, was to catch one wave. Just let me get one wave in 15 minutes, I said to myself. Considering the conditions, I was delighted to catch anything. By the time I went in at 2 pm, conditions were completely blown out: 8 knot winds, 4-5 foot waves, and a northbound current so strong it would have carried me to San Luis Obispo in 20 minutes if I let it. I was stunned to have four scored waves by the end of my heat. I never left the whitewater. Didn't even try. But I did stand up on a couple. I was absolutely tickled and exhausted by the end of the heat. Haley and Sherri met me with leis, making a big deal of my first solo competition. It was incredibly thoughtful. The whole day was about feeling real -- feeling like a real person, loved and considered -- my Golden Girl era begun.

There is something about putting on that jersey to compete that makes me feel so good. The colored jersey is about being seen -- the judges can't see you, don't know you, but my white with pink sleeves jersey tells them who I am. I can be seen in the water. Getting a scored wave means someone has observed my attempt and considered it. Like the father I never had, the judge gave me some feedback in the form of a score. FOUR scores, adding up to a 3.77, 4th place out of 4 competitors in my heat. I was thrilled. I heard my name called from the announcers over the roar of the crashing waves at one point: they saw me and commented something. I didn't hear what they said, but the announcers had been funny and encouraging all day to others. I was there. Others saw me. I was seen. I was a real person that day. After a lifetime of being invisible, I felt real.

Over these past few years, the ocean has helped me feel real. Getting slapped around by Mother Ocean means I am a body in space being acted upon by the water. I can feel the edges of my body in the cold expanse. Feel myself getting spun under the waves or flowing above them. I cannot think my way into a wave; it's my body that responds to the energy of the water. The cold water is regulating to my nervous system. I feel better all over, calmer, more peaceful, just tickled by the sight of a leash around my ankle in the green sea.

My surf sisters have made me feel real. Haley and Sherri's thoughtfulness helped me feel important and worthy of the day together. I love hanging out with them. There is an ease with them. I can relax. Casual conversation throughout the day together, laughs and support, it was fun. Kindness. Consideration. Joy. Everyone on time, sharing funds, helping each other out. It reminded me what the Sisterhood was at the beginning. A place to feel an easy belonging. People showed up for each other as a matter of course over those first two or so years. It was beautiful.

For about the last year, though, the Sisterhood has faded for me. Queen of the South Bay was with two people who started the Sisterhood -- the OG's -- and it felt that way. Sisterhood was about inclusion and belonging, generosity and support. The whole has not felt that way for me for a long time. I did a relationship autopsy the other day -- an analysis I do when romantic relationships end, I take stock of what happened. It's a lesson in impermanence to see how it slowly fell apart from my perspective. I stress "from my perspective" because the group still exists, it is just very different from where I sit. It doesn't have the same feel anymore. People got complicated.

Different things have happened to break up the original group. One person broke an ankle and doesn't come anymore. One person moved away. Another got busy with family, another with work. Every day problems got in the way of people showing up. A big thing for me, though, was that a smaller group of sisters separated themselves off into their own chat. I think it started innocently enough -- a desire to not slam the big chat with daily surfing logistics. But over time, those people got closer to each other and stopped inviting the rest of us to go out with them. It continues to be a hurtful exclusion. A breach of our unstated ethics of inclusion and generosity. Between the originals who stopped coming, and the people who separated themselves, I have been left feeling like I have no where to belong. New people have come in and have been lovely, but they haven't felt like "my people." They are more interested in surfing than relationship. So, for me, the Sisterhood has become a source of pain, a place where my old wound of invisibility gets activated again. Queen of the South Bay day was a return to the beautiful feelings of when we started: I didn't have to doubt that I belonged.

So the ocean, the competition, and some of my surf sisters help me feel real. At the end of the day with Sherri and Haley, I thought why in the world would I want to spend any more time worrying about people who do not show up for me? Why do I keep looking over at people who are not looking back? Feeling real means I can choose now. I have choices that I am actively making. I am choosing to spend my time with people who give back to me with that generosity of spirit I felt at QOTSB. A natural, flowing golden light of love and thoughtfulness. This is new. I am no longer chasing the father that didn't show up for me and I wondered why I wasn't good enough for him. I am no longer performing perfection in order be loved by a mother who had to have me a certain way to feel good about herself. I am my own person now. Some freedom to be myself and feel ok in my own skin. I can choose now. Choice is freedom.

An additional responsibility here is to choose my path without blame or anger to others who cannot accompany me on it. One of the Lojong phrases is: drive all blames into one. It means to learn from everything that happens to us. What can I take away from this experience? What can I learn? As my own person, how do I want to be in the world? I have combed through my own suffering to end up here, what is the point of that other than to see that the whole world suffers? Sherri did not want to participate in a competition, because being seen is somehow threatening to her. She cannot bear the scrutiny. The separating surf sisters didn't want to participate in the whole group anymore. I can invent all kinds of reasons why that look through the lens of shame and suffering, but I'm not going to do that here. For weeks, I have been sifting through my reactions and possible reasons why, but I can simply look at the behavior without assigning intentions of my own invention. They simply aren't playing anymore. I feel sad about that, but the sadness is mine for the lack of inclusion. They might be quite happy together. It may have been a good choice for them. I take away a set of values from these disparate experiences.

I choose to spend time with people who share my values. Belonging, inclusion, support, joy, love, ease. People who put relationships first -- put their relationship with me as a priority as I prioritize them. Mutual. This is new. The choosing is new and choosing mutuality is new and understanding that we all make these choices for our own best interests is new. I have spent a great many decades welcoming in anyone who floats past, happy to have companionship, not feeling like I was very worthwhile myself. Seeing all failed relationships as a personal rejection. I no longer need to see things this way. A new clarity is here. Paths diverge for lots of reasons. Most often, it has nothing to do with me. I want to welcome people who are with me for reasons that DO have something to do with me. I want to be seen. As Sophia from The Golden Girls said, "This is what friendships are built on: loyalty, mutual respect, trust."

QOTSB showed me that I was a worthy participant. All day, I was seen and loved and included. I gave support and received it. Shared joy and smoothies. There was an ease to the company. Having experiences like this soothe my inner abandoned child -- show her that she can be seen and it's fun. It's loving. It's ok. We can participate with people and it's ok. We don't have to hide anymore. Being a Golden Girl means including myself in the circle of compassion and love and light. The four Brahmaviharas of loving kindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity exist in a field -- like a magnetic field. I can participate in this field, plug my self into it, receive as well as give. It flows through me as it flows through others. Spending time with people who also participate in that flow is what surfing is all about. A celebration, not a competition.