Death Wish
It’s a rough day on the North Shore of Maui. Driving to Baldwin Beach, I pass by Ho’okipa, the famous windsurfing beach, where the waves are at least 15-feet high. I almost drive off the road trying to watch the surfers. From this distance they look tiny ants on the waves. A few miles from here is the famous big wave surf spot called Peahi, or Jaws. When they held the World Surfing Competition at Jaws a week ago, the waves were 40-50 feet high.
I go Baldwin, where I join up with my swim friends. There are five of us who trek down to the beach: Max, Crafton, Tom, Katharine, Daniel and myself. The wind batters us as we come around the corner to the beach. The wind is gusting up to 65 Kilometers an hour. We can scarcely hear ourselves talk. “I’m going to stay inside the reef today,” Max shouts against the wind. “Right on,” says Crafton. Tom and Katharine nod their heads and give a thumbs up signal
Daniel and I look at each other, then at the huge waves outside the reef. “Well, we could go out a little bit,” says Daniel, with a playful grin. Daniel, a former Ironman triathlete, is ten years younger than me and is in great shape, deeply tanned and powerfully built.
“Go out a little bit!” I laugh, yelling in his ear. “Once we go out, there’s only one way back in – and that’s through the shore break!”
“Let’s see,” he smiles, as he pulls on his goggles.
Once we’re in the water, I can’t resist the urge to out further. I spot Daniel and point out beyond the reef. Daniel sees me and nods his head. We swim towards the channel, where the rip current is rushing through a narrow gap between reef and beach. We let the current carry us out. The channel is only about three feet deep, with rocks a foot under the surface. It’s like a wild Disneyland water ride, with brilliant white foam splashing over our heads as we get swept out into the ocean. We duck under breaking waves as they crash over us, sounding like a freight train.
Usually it gets calmer a hundred yards out into deeper water, but today the big waves don’t let up. We ride up one side and down the other. “Wahoooo!” I yell out at the top of my lungs. We’re just outside the spot where they break, but they’re rising up ten or fifteen feet. Looking towards shore I see the backs of the waves as they curl over and break. It’s an awesome sight. The roar of the wind and the sound of the crashing waves is deafening. Holy shit, how am I going to back in through that? I ask myself.
We swim on towards Stage II, fighting the current, being flung up and down on some huge waves, ducking under the bigger ones, which start to break early. There’s no let up. I start to lose my breath. Daniel is forging ahead, with no fins, just a pair of swim goggles. When we stop for a breather, I ask, “Shall we head back?”
“Maybe a little bit more,” he shouts, as a wave washes over his head. “Okay, why not?” I yell. Onwards we swim, being tumbled around as if in a washing machine. It’s hard to tell how far we’ve come. I can barely make out the shore.
Finally we start swimming back. After some time I look up and can’t see Daniel anywhere. I turn 360 degrees and still can’t see him. It’s hard to see anything with my mask fogged up and the waves crashing over me. I don’t notice that the current is rapidly taking me towards the reef. With the waves this big, the current is like a rocket ship, propelling me along. When I tread water to get my bearings, to my shock, I feel coral just a few feet feet underneath me. I look to shore and see that I’m way beyond the spot I usually get out. All I can see is black rocks just under the water. Oh boy, I think. I’m going to get smashed on the reef if I try to get in here. I’ve got to get back to where the sand is.
The waves keep throwing me up and down. I start to swim against the current. After a few minutes I see that I’m not getting anywhere. The current is incredibly strong and the waves keep crashing over my head. Thank God for having fins. I start to get winded. I can barely make out Daniel far off on the shore, waving at me. I force myself to stay calm, and keep swimming towards my exit point.
Finally I make some progress. The water is all churned up, brown, and choppy. Breathe, breathe, I tell myself, as I struggle to get to shore. The rip current pulls me out as I fight against it. I duck under the breaking waves. I reach down with my fins to see if I can feel the bottom. Nothing. I keep swimming on my back, so I can see the waves bearing down on me. At last I touch. I pull off my fins, but the rip current keeps pulling me out. A big wave crashes over me, throwing me towards the shore. Then another one. Finally a wave rolls me over and over, as I hold my fins tightly against my chest so they won’t get ripped away. When I put my feet down, I can feel the bottom and get traction. I fight against the receding waves, using all my strength to exit the water.
I rip off my mask, and hold my fins high. Daniel greets me with a hug and a huge grin. I’ve survived to live another day.
As we walk back, Daniel points to a surf break far off shore. “You know, Peter, I used to windsurf out there in 20-foot waves. When I crashed, I’d often lose my board, the mast and the sails. They’d all be smashed to pieces. I’d have to swim in half a mile through the surf to get to land.”
“Now you tell me!” I laugh and laugh.
It’s one thing to be doing this in your twenties or thirties, but I’m 76 for God’s sake. Do I have a death wish or something?
Maybe I do. I get a kick out of putting myself in dangerous situations and making it thorough. Perhaps I’m running from the fear of watching my body disintegrate, a terror of becoming Alice in the movie Still Alice. I’d rather exit on a high note. Who wouldn’t? But do I have a choice?
I think of my friend Ram Dass, who wrote so brilliantly about aging in his book Still Here. Every time I see him, I marvel at his ability to surrender to what is. With his body a wreck, condemned to spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair, enduring pain and discomfort, he always has a smile and a twinkle in his eyes for anyone who approaches him; he continues to share his teachings through retreats, books, and films. He turns the affliction of his stroke into a way of loving and serving others. Now, that’s inspiring.
Everyone I know has a different take on death. My first wife Fran, who was only 46 when she discovered she had terminal cancer, fought against dying to the end. My second wife Linda, who had a horrible, painful autoimmune illness for over ten years, couldn’t wait to die. She knew deep down that all her loved ones would be waiting for her on the other side. Four years ago, she accidentally took too many pain pills, and died right in front of me. My third wife Susan, wants to live as long as she possible can, using every resource she can to stay alive. Everyone has their own way of handling this.
I’m in a different camp. I agree with Oliver Sacks, the best selling author and neurologist, who wrote just before he died, “I have loved and been loved; I have been given much and I have given something in return; I have read and traveled and thought and written.”
My life has been rich and full, with at least seven lives compacted into one. I’m ready to go anytime. What’s harder is to have the courage to persevere on, as I watch everything slowly deteriorate, like an old car on its last legs. The only way through is to remember that who I am is not this body. Who I am is not this mind, not these emotions, not these beliefs. Who I am was never born, and never dies. Let’s see if I can remember this when the going gets really rough!