Addicted to Joy - Soul
Our Origin story
I’ve written a little about the beginning of Addicted to Joy, but on a weekend of holiday reflection, I think I want to write from my heart about sometimes doing things that have no basis in any kind of reality, but I did it anyway. Here goes.
I had been a media creator for a midwestern company for twenty=one years; new management found me redundant, and I was given my walking papers. Eight months later this 150 million dollar company was out of business.
I jumped right into a new life where I was the boss. In the first few months, I did a video book for a major music publisher, ran audio for the Pat Tillman conference in Chicago, and started doing more and more music videos. I was doing great, actually making more money than I ever had in my corporate position and I was having a lot of fun.
I was working with The Carolyn Sills Combo, and we went to film a recording at another friend’s studio, Wind River Studios in the Santa Cruz Mountains. During the recording, I looked up in the ceiling and there was this beautiful surfboard and I talked to the owner about it. Over the sink in the kitchen was another one.
The video didn’t work out that day but the studio owner talked to me after and said “Why don’t you come for lunch, I’d like to do a coffee table book of my collection of wood surfboards?” This was my introduction to Chuck Pyle and Sandor Nagyszalanczy.
Chuck told me the story of Larry Fuller and how he was creating this collection of surfboards from famous surfers and shapers. Chuck was supplying some of the rare and ancient wood for the project, and he had quite a collection already. Sandor was a nationally recognized editor and writer about craftsmanship; he was also a heck of a Uke player. To me, it sounded more like a movie than a coffee table book. That was on a Friday, and on Monday of the next week, the three of us were on our way to meet Larry in southern California.
The next three days were magical. I was introduced to Al Merrick, Carl Eckstrom, Jim Phillips, and Rene Yater, among others.
I knew very little about who I was talking to and how they were the real originators of surfing as it developed into what it has become today. I had a little surfing experience when I lived in Santa Monica in the early 80s, but an early injury told me that I was too reckless to be standing on a board with 1 million marbles underneath it, but I really felt the STOKE of surfing.
In those three days in Febuary 2014, I fell in love with the stories I was told, and I was impressed with the men I had met and interviewed. The interviews were from the heart, and they came across that way on video. It was truly a magical three days, meeting all these men, staying at a wonderous ranch on the coast, sleeping in the bed the Dalai Lama slept in, and eating a really great hamburger in Oceanside. I came home and tried to read everything I could, watch all the YouTube videos and films I could find, and try to educate myself about this noble experience.
Back home in Santa Monica, Larry was busy at work with many shapers and surfers; I was doing about an interview a week and really getting behind in logging and viewing what I was recording. I developed a mindset of becoming a collector of these interviews, putting them in a basket and then watching them later to see where the common thread was. I believe I did 50% of the interviews that appeared in the final film in the first 6 months, a whirlwind of experience.
Sandor fell away after the first couple of months as he had to travel quite a distance to get down to Monterey, and he had other interests. Chuck stayed with the project for a couple of years but had interests of his own. Over 10 years later, I’m still infected with the story and the gratitude that I feel when I get to tell you about it.
I want to thank you all for reading Wood Water Soul. Please share this Blog with a fellow surfer or with a friend who needs some Joy in their lives. I invite you to watch, Addicted to Joy for free, Aloha.