When I woke up and my feet hit the sand, there were two milestones I was thinking about. One very important one was that it was my friend and Hermosa pier crew member Boris Vishnevsky’s surf birthday and he was turning one.
Boris met Frank Paine, Redondo surf coach and Guru to all, at Brother’s Burritos a little over a year ago — they instantly clicked, and Boris decided soon after that it was finally time to take the Pacific plunge. Fast forward a year through Frank’s patient and guiding hands, and Boris has a brand new surfboard named Natasha, and complete stoke of the sea. His giddiness and smiles in the water light up the Hermosa pier, which is where he has spent most of his mornings. We all love surfing with Boris and his eagerness is infectious, and every time he gets in the water, we know it will be a good day.
We had a few bumpy Hermosa rollers, then went back to the Burrito Palace (Brother’s Burritos) where a surprise cake with his (poorly icing-drawn by me) surfboard Natasha on it was waiting for him. We celebrated his year of pure stoke, then parted ways, wishing him many more years to come.
The other milestone is that I’m officially 2/3rds of the way to a year, and I can’t believe how it seems like you can blink, and lifetime of experiences are suddenly memories. Â My thoughts when I first started my mission were “this is going to feel like forever” or “there’s no way I’ll make it to a year”, and as the days passed, my love affair with the sea grew stronger, and before long I wasn’t simply counting the days, I was making every day count, fully and wholeheartedly. Â And every day I enjoy it more, and every day it goes by faster than the last.
