Paddle Boarding, 2.0

 ??? Real???

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From: Stephen Wigg <stephenwigg@hotmail.com>
Sent: Saturday, June 5, 2021 6:12:27 PM
To: Mark wigg <mark_wigg@hotmail.com>
Subject: Paddle Boarding 2.1

 







Paddle Boarding 2.1

I got out and did it! I haven’t watched any videos of what a really good “Barker” (SUP’s brand. (SUP = Stand Up Paddler)), can do on it, other than to come across a young guy in the middle of Lake Harriet, who complimented me on getting, and I quote, “the best board on the market.” He was laying on his stomach, doing swimming strokes on a smaller Barker board, (inland surfboard in my opinion), as we met.

I immediately, immodesty right under the surface, asked if he’d ever been on a SUP like mine.

“Not for three months.”

“Well yeah, winter?” I said. 

“College.”

“During Covid?”

But I recovered [tough crowd], and asked if he was willing to give me a lesson. Whereby, he was showing, with little prowess, how you can race-turn around a buoy by running to the back and whipping it around, bow shooting out of the water like the prudential whale/formerly Prudential rock? 

That’s Paddle Boarding 4.0. Or never. But never say never. 

One profound question that keeps popping up; I don’t snowboard, skateboard, or wake-board facing forward, feet side-by-side. I pointed out that peculiarity to my new Bark-a-sahn and he just said, with a coy smile, “some do, whatever makes you happy.”

What is happiness? (But I digress, albeit it to say being able to fucking paddle board comfortably is a happiness goal.)

🎼 Happiness is an Orange sup... 🎵 

I started out with my full wetsuit. Went out about 100 meters, then purposely, and gracefully, fell back into the water cuz I was sweating like a stuck pig.

[Side bar] We were going to have a huge pork-roast at the frat house, and a frat-farmer brought the hog in alive, duh. As I’m staring at tomorrow’s pulled pork extravaganza I’m sitting there wondering if it knows what’s going on, cuz pigs are smart, but vain, (Hellooo? Miss Piggy? Name a pig who isn’t vain, and Peppa is on the bottom of the list. (Of pigs who aren’t vain)).

Nobody was around so I picked up a sharp stick and wondered if it would sweat like a stuck pig, (which it was, caged up and all), or does “stuck” mean stuck, as in poked, prodded, stabbed? If I poked said pig with a sharp stick in the eye, where would it sweat, and when it did sweat, would it be all over its body or just its tongue, like a dog? Then I remembered why they love pig pens. Not to get dirty, (the pigs, not me), but to cool off and not get sunburned with that bare skin. (Google it)

This pig was not pink, it was mostly black,(so I felt less sympathy for it, (quite the racist in 1973-1977, blame my dad)), and it was probably a hybrid mixed breed, “efficiently” taking no more than 3 months from birth to butcher, 200 pounds later, jacked with all the chemicals and steroids designed at the time. #DrugsAreMoney

Where was I?

I went to stand up, on the SUP, not true pig, [try to keep up], and my legs started to do the Charleston again. (Dammit, it wasn’t the new Rx that gave me loss of balance it’s the dope! And my Plantar fasciitis! #OldAgeSux

#ButIPersisted.

There was a grandma with her grandkids doing something on the starboard beach but I peeked over there, to see if they were muttering how magnificent the board looked, and what was the old guy doing on such a nice board, when I almost fell down. I can’t turn my head without losing balance. Then it hit me - I was looking at the point on the bow. I started looking up, gained my balance, silently scoffed at Bark-a-sahn for not teaching me to fucking look up...

[CRASH COURSE IN BALANCE] I don’t look down on a wakeboard, skateboard, or the other..., (oh yeah, the snowboard, (I broke my wrist on the way up the bunny hill to get “free” lessons in a snowboard the venders were letting us use for free, (always a sucker for a good deal), but, in my defense, I didn’t fucking stand facing forward, feet side-bayside.

[Redundancy to make a point] On the way up, with the free loaner, I fell on the way up to the bunny hill for free lessons. (Made my point yet? I can copy and paste:

(I broke my wrist on the way up the bunny hill to get “free” lessons on a snowboard ghat the venders were letting us use for free, (always a sucker for a good deal)

I was on the kiddie lift, where you put the round thing, (like a tire swing attached to a rope, (only the best are attached to a rope)), between your legs and let it pull you up slowly, at a kiddie/bunny hill pace, so why am I looking down on Bark? Sure, she’s a good looking board, the best on the market, but it wasn’t a natural impulse.

And my Wobblies could be my fear of re-breaking my starboard ankle. 

I got past the judgmental shore-huggers and decided to venture back out to open water, the next small leeward bay, on the board, initially standing sideways, then tried to shuffle my feet to more of a fore-aft position, like all other sports that end in the word, board, other than pegboard, (which is not a sport, so I rest my case, (you’re thinking mumble peg, me too... initially...))

Nope, must be a lesson after SUP 1.2, 1.3, 2.0, 2.1, etc. 

At this point I was all the way across the lake. How far? Without my glasses, who cares? But I got a knot in my hamstring again, like last night.

Oh yeah, while laying in bed, I get a muscle knot in my port side, (see what I did there?) leg. So strong that I couldn’t massage it out, I had to stand. I was zipped in so that was a daunting task. I did a downward dog and that was temporarily relieved. I went to lay down, switching to the feeble position, when the other let’s hamstring went tight on me, like it was a contest. I went to my back, massaged that one out, and the other went into hyper mode, again having to do the downward dog.

And I had to pee, subsequently, standing up and walking outside to pee was not what the doctor would have ordered. (He’s the one who introduced me to the lazy man’s cup o’ tea), so, even though I wanted to ween myself of my portable urinal, (I call her Dribble), I crawled out to my front porch, and peed in and on Dribble, immediately pouring out her contents right outside the door, letting no air become my wrist and the screen’s precision-ally unzipped opening.

So, I started to feel my hamstring tighten up, and I was across the lake. 

[Glimmer of Metaphorical Hope] I kayaked past a half dozen hot-yoga yogis last summer, who were doing yoga on their paddle boards in a quiet bay between Bde Maka Ska and Lake of the Isles. (There’s a Jim-dandy Minnesota seasonal activity for ya, dontcha know?) I was impressed at how smoothly they were able to go to downward dog, but were any of them writhing from the pain of a pulled hamstring, with the other waiting in the wings? I think not.

A list was formed on the back of my eyelids:

• I knew from last week’s first failed fiasco that those same hamstrings would tighten up if I sat and paddled again today. In fact, I don’t think they completely healed from the raucous time with Mia and Olive, when I first felt a tug on my hammies, but it was worth it.
• Kneeling was impossible because I hurt my knee in the Lula dream I had just hours ago, during a delightful REM phase of sleep. (#I❤️Fitbit.)
• I was too far away from civilization to hear anybody who would respond with anything other than, “you alright?” Because if I assume it’s that question, and not, “do you need help?” Which would leave me to fall back on hand signs, passed down for generations, like, ‘Come here,’ followed by my new sign for please, (or thank you), small circular motion from chin to top of chest. (I do know what the sign is for ‘you’re welcome - make the shape like you are rubbing your beer baby, or nine months of pregnancy with Twins. (But now I’m just being silly). 
• If I just paddled with my feet side-ways, I can prayerfully make it back.
• Then, since my ear worms have not served me well since my silent retreat began, I started chanting the mantra of the infamous phrase that has been masterfully used by yours truly, taught to my kids to do everything from sinking a basket to learning to ride a bike. “I think I can, I think I can...”

My hamstrings aren’t pulled but they are... almost pulled? I’m resilient, so #Fuckit.

And I lived to tell about it. 

Uh oh! 

When I came back to camp, there was just a car with an empty boat trailer parked, and no other campers. So, I was alone until I’d hear them beach it and I’d have time to clean up my act.

My first impulse was to strip off my wetsuit, and my Speedo, and walk around naked. A dozen marauding horseflies read my mind and started swarming around my nether regions. So I kept the speedo on and came into the gazebo, turned my chair with its back to the road, and his parked car, and started to recount my heretofore drama-free day, (other than worrying about not being able to get back, and that I stupidly didn’t spray my bare arms and shoulders with PF50, so I’d have a funny farmers tan when they finally saw us, Bark and me, because it was like big overalls.) in my defense, I had on my tank-top body glove thingy when I initially sprayed.

Went inside the gazebo, zipped it up and down fast. Forgot something in the car, went out of gazebo, forgetting to zip it down, cuz I was only going to be a minutiae of a minute, and then forgot why I went to the car in the first place. When I get that stupid, I can feel guilty for making my brain so foggy, or smoke more and laugh it all off. Or forget it happened, and laugh about it later when my mind calms down.

4/20

I’m splitting open the end of one of my cherished smokes, putting some of the tobacco on top of the sativa called Wet Dog, and jonesing for a tug. It’s been hours - 3.3 to be precise, (don’t judge me).

Ahh, the inhalation-combination of relinquishing the nicotine addiction and the dependency on pot, (there is a difference), in one big, hold-your-breath-until-it-comes-out-clear-of-smoke exhale, and I hear a man’s voice closely behind me, to my left, standing what has become my own private yard on public land. 

What does he see? I’m sitting in my Speedo, back to him, and for all he knows I could be one of those city slickers from “The Cities” who lets it hang out to get bit by a horsefly. But I’m in my gazebo, so I’m not a stupid city-slicker, I’m refined.

Then the bulleted follow-ups to whatever I said, cuz at this point I was way past good, positive initial impressions, (and forgot what I said), I came up with these contingencies, tossed them to a panel, got a call back, and narrowed down my replies based on his eye contact, which was not on my bedroom eyes:

1. “Want some?”
1. Then I forgot to previously test to see if lurkers can see into my gazebo screen, or is the sun hitting it so it’s like a double mirror, I can see them, but he can’t see me?
2. “‘Sup?” To which he could reply, and I quote, “best board on the market, that your bad boy?” (if he knows what a SUP is.) And if he does, does he know mine cost more than... well, it cost a lot new, I got it for a steal. #I❤️Craigslist
3. “Catch anything?” I assumed he was there to fish.

I went with the last ice-breaker, and he said, “only the whiff of that wacky tobacky.”

I was about to ask, ‘want some?” so I stood to face him cuz he was over my deaf left shoulder and you don’t offer dope, (laced with nicotine), without looking a person in the eye. Dope ain’t cheap, and it’s not legal. Duh.

He had a really big gun, with a utilitarian-looking holster. And he wasn’t smiling. I went reaching for a cigarette, to hide my shaking hands, (cuz adrenaline did it’s thing), and picked up the one with the gnarley end, from which I had pilfered some tobacco, to which, forthwith, I hadn’t offered any of my pipe-spliff to my gun-slinging-NRA’er friend. And Covid. Can’t be too safe.

“Guess you need a gun that big to kill them huge crocs, by cracky?” I said, with a straight, cuz the hit hadn’t kicked in yet, face, and a chortle at the end. (I crack me up).

“Alligators,” he corrected me. “What happened to the end of your cigarette?”

“Good smoke like this here Marlboro Gold 100, can’t smoke it all at once...”

He touched his hand to the little lock-strap-thingy on his holster. Only this was a big strap cuz he had a big gun and I was trying to figure out how to light my spliff-raped cigarette - without looking all stupid in my Speedo - do I pinch it off or just look stupider and light it as is, letting the ignited paper touch my well-toned, albeit farmer-tan-in-the-making, body.

“Whatcha smoking there?” he asked. I lost count how many times he asked me that directly but his body languages... once.

“Wet Dog.” (Never lie to an armed anything.)

“Huh?”

“It’s a sativa strain I purchased legally in Oregon, called Wet Dog.

“So, you bought it legally, then broke federal interstate laws driving it across state lines?”

“Well, I didn’t drive over state lines, I flew, and just how high up do you have to be to be in international airspace laws that apply? Huh?”

“What about when you land and take off?” he said.

“Well, there’s that,” I said. “How about... (scratched my chin, (thought you were going to say balls, huh?) ... I bought it up on the border, along Knife Lake, where they have a little umbrella kiosk and sell it legally, with the buyer having one foot on Canada and the other on America?”

“You mean like that root beer at Knife Lake Dorothy’s place?”

“If you call that root-beer,” I laughed comfortably, “and what scout, who cuts off two inches of his toothbrush to save weight for the 50 mile paddling merit badge, is going to carry loose change?”

“Could bring paper money, duh.”

“For what?”

He moved closer, either because there really was a double mirror effect and he had some latent homosexual tendencies, or urges, (which is worse, tendencies or urges? I have urges to pee, but tendencies? Well, all the time, right before the urge, like clockwork, tendencies... (Not that there’s anything wrong with that) - and this body dot dot dot... when you overlook that crepe paper skin, it’s not bad for crepe paper skin. And I look better when I’m evenly tanned.

“Who you duh-ing, white-boy?”

“I need to write you up,” he said.

I looked down and just then (I swear) realized he had interrupted my subconscious ball scratching, (and the only good way to scratch and pull back to the dragging-ball-sack status quo of the men’s (redundancy) scrotums, is to pull them out, yank and let them air out. It’s a Speedo! #FreeYourBalls

I found my initial foible, (illegal in most states), and without missing a beat, like zipping up when your barn door is open, I tried to tuck them both, (what would be the point of just tucking in my favorite one?), back in but then remembered I had innocently pulled the Speedo way up the crack of my ass because I had just bathed my ass so I would nothave to know the presumptive conclusion of wearing a g-string all night, too many tacos, and no bidet. (It’s not a sexy visualization’ but they could rinse them in the sink and hang them to dry - not too much material). But I wondered if I ever would have the guts to wear men’s butt floss on a dare.

[SELF-EDITOR’S NOTE] I didn’t pull it up g-string-fashion, I pulled the Speedo aside to air the five-years-dormant, (but not flaccid and impotent), appendage out. {Total honesty - I pulled up the other side to be symmetrical} I call him, Hank. You know, like, “don’t yank Hank, baby, you’re not starting a mower” kind of nickname? Kinda rolls off your tongue, don’t it?

“Don’t judge me,” I scoffed, as I caught a slight glint in his eye.

[At this point of many a famed Roger monologues, I’d finally ask, “did you really say that?” 

And Roger would say, “No, but I wanted to.”]

I turned, as if I could see what my ass looked like to him by staring at my own ass in the reflection of my car, and spun back around and giggled.

“My ass isn’t all crepe paper!” I think I said to myself, but at this point, I mean, come on, I couldn’t write better fiction than this...

Or could I? 

p.s. When your farts smell worse than he shitter you’re trying to avoid, #MaskUp!

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