12/31/2023 1 Comment PICKING A SURF MEMORYby Corky Carroll I was sitting here looking at the screen on my trusty old coal powered computer contemplating what I was going to tell you about today. It’s the last column of the year, so obvious choices would be a re-cap of the year gone by or possible a list of my personal “new years resolutions.” Off the top of my head I can’t really pinpoint anything “revolutionary” that took place in ’23. And my only real resolution is to make it to ’25. So, nothing there. So, in a moment of inner clarity, what I decided to do was just pick a random surf memory. A few came to mind, and I am going with this one. I will call it “The Day that I Ditched.” I was lucky as a kid to have grown up in Surfside Colony. Our home was right on the beach. This allowed me to surf close to all the time. During the school year I was able to get in a good hour before school and all the time afterwards until it got dark. School was where all the chicks were, so I never really felt the need to ditch school to go surfing. Except for the one time I did. Huntington Beach High School, winter of 1961/62. I was a freshman. There was a little grassy knoll behind the snack bar where some of the surf crowd hung out. Actually, all of the surf crowd. It wasn’t all that big a group at that time. We did have some good surfing talent there though. Rich Chew, Robert August, John Boozer, Bill Fury and a few more. Two of them were Denny Buell and Tommy Leonardo.
Denny was a senior, super good surfer and a solid “ladies’ man.” One of my favorite memories of him ( a sub-memory here ), was one day in Civics class right after lunch. We were all sitting there and the teacher was just about ready to start the class. Denny Buell, who was not in the class, comes strolling casually thru the door and walks right to the desk of the most beautiful girl in the room. She looks up at him and he bends over and gives her this full on romantic and long kiss. Silence in the room. Then he stands up and just as casually walks back out the door. Even the teacher was speechless. It was impressive. Tommy Leonardo was known as “Top Mouth on the Coast.” That dude was so sarcastic that his reputation went far and wide. He was an excellent surfer too, you just didn’t wanna get on his bad side. So, it’s a beautiful clear day with “Santa Ana” offshore winds blowing. A really good south swell running too. It’s lunch time and Denny, Tom and I arrive at the grassy knoll at the same time. Denny has this gleam in his eye. “We gotta blow outta here and hit the pier, its epic conditions.” HBHS was a “closed” campus. There were teachers posted by the exits to the streets. Denny says we should make a run for it. Hey, when one of the best surfers in school, and a senior, says lets go for it… ya gotta go for it. So, we did. We got the edge of the campus and waited until the teacher in that area was looking the other way. Then b-lined it as fast as we could run down the street toward the pier. There was a house about a block away from the beach where a lot of guys stashed their boards. We went there, commandeered boards and paddled out. The surf was fantastic, and we were they only three people in the water. All went very well for about thirty minutes. At that time there was a shout from the pier. It was Mr. Brown, the Vice Principal. Uh oh!!! “Mr. Buell, Mr. Leonardo, Mr. Carroll.” Yikes, that’s us. “Surf looks great, see you all in my office tomorrow morning at 8 AM.” He then smiled, waved and walked off. On the surface he seemed friendly enough, maybe it wasn’t gonna be all that bad? The result was we all got suspended for 3 days. I spent my “mini vacation” surfing over in Seal Beach, pretending I was going to school. I could sign my dad’s name perfectly, which I did on the notice they sent to my house which I grabbed from the post office before it could make it to my parents. But, that was the only time that I ever ditched school. I guess I learned my lesson. When I think of this memory I can hear in my head, “Bad boys, bad boys….. whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do when they come of you?”
1 Comment
Aaron
1/17/2024 02:13:44 pm
Love you Corky!
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