Learning to Surf at Fifty-Five

My daughter booked me a surf lesson for my fifty-fifth birthday as a joke. She thought I'd chicken out. I did not.

The instructor was a twenty-two-year-old named Kai with sun-bleached hair who told me I had "excellent board energy." I fell off fourteen times. I swallowed half the Pacific Ocean. I got tumbled so hard once that my sunglasses ended up in my swimsuit.

On the fifteenth wave, I stood up. I rode it for about four seconds, all the way into the shallows, with my arms out like a bird. Kai screamed. My daughter, on the beach, screamed. A group of teenagers nearby screamed.

I've been back eight times since. I'm still terrible. I don't care. For four seconds every so often, I am flying.