Can’t you feel ‘em circlin’ honey?
Can’t you feel ‘em swimmin’ around?
You got fins to the left, fins to the right, and you’re the only bait in town.
—Fins, Jimmy Buffett
Being shocked and shamed into immediate submission has had a pleasantly
sporty side effect on me. Great White sharks no longer scare me.
I have a healthy respect for them, but I no longer fear them. I have
come to peace, rather than to pieces, with my bug-eyed friends and
co-habitants here at the top of the food chain.
It took a while, and countless encouraging words from twitchy locals
who speak highly of their odds with the toothy preds and the fact that
they have a better chance of getting struck by lightning than being
eaten by a Great White. It took many false starts, and whatever mind
that I could muster over considerable matter to get into cold, thick
water without reeking of dead chicken.
The waters that surround my barrack home along the artichoke and
strawberry fields of central California are prime habitat for the
Greats. The waters are protected by international laws so stringently
enforced that not even an extraordinary rendition performed by
black-boated phantoms in the foggy night can produce their severed fins
for the waiting elixirs and soup bowls of Red China.
They are fat and happy and know that they are free to skim the waves
that I now ply with total impunity and a raw, basic badassness. Theirs
is a true freedom, which I respect greatly now that my own is being
bought and sold like a worthless, redundant search engine. In a
strange, unexpected turn of events, it took signing up for the nastiest
sort of Suit work for me to lose The Fear, and now I can surf with
total comfort and general calm.
After all, once you have amputated the very heart of your soul for the
right to work endlessly in pursuit of irrational profit, nothing can be
worse and, in fact, being mercilessly ripped in half by a giant
gnashing guppy seems a far better fate than the emphasemic choke of
company tie wear and the humiliation born from forced sweater-vesting.
Karma is at play here. I realize that. I am not that stupid to invite
bloody havoc upon my person, and I want to live in the best of ways,
worse than anyone. This life has hope, and intrigue, and magic and joy
yet to realize. No, this is more of a drastic coming to the grips of my
career throttle, backing off the adventurous gears and settling into a
far more profitable, extremely conservative cruising speed. Baby needs
a new belly ring, the dog has been spoiled, the Chevy took a shit and
the Stranahan’s needs replacing. Times are tough, we are all receding
into times of tumult and some heavy dues paying.
Skills and history and experience and personality mean nothing here in
this new life, only that you know your way around the business end of a
Schick and have a strong belt for beating back the howling demons of
inefficiency. Upselling has become paramount, and failure to do so is a
maverick action that could lead to an unplanned disappearance. I
hesitate to even write of these things. Perhaps I should get back to
sports. To surfing, where I started.
I was not always a steady friend of the Great White. I once waded in
their waters with all antennae up, my internal radar set to Detect At
All Costs, my standard, practiced response to flee in terror at the
mere sight of a fin. It was hardly fun at all to splash in the waves.
The dolphins mocked me from the foamy barrels that I sought.
I dreamt of lightweight chain mail and mind-blowing sonic fish
jamming technologies. But that was a different time, and certainly
unprofitable, if not improbable. What use is chain mail when you are
drowning at the bottom of the sea, or swallowed whole? Why jam their
brains when you can come into sync with them, understand them. Great
White’s eat fear like offal appetizers, and thus it only took losing my
fear of them to ride amongst them.
To get there, all that I had to do was to shave. When your greatest
fears have been realized, lesser fears become comforting, and the
rewards that they kept you from can be fully realized. Now if I can
just learn to stand up, this ride might just last.
Corby Anderson writes Hang Time for the Aspen Daily News from the
innards of a breakaway nation founded by golfers somewhere along the
central California coast.
