RonPrice
Prospect
Joined: 12 Aug 2009
Posts: 9
Location: George Town Tasmania Australia
|
 Posted: 2/13/2010, 6:34 am Post subject: Surfing: A Personal Comment |
 |
|
SURFING
The sport of surfing exploded in popularity in the 1950s and 1960s when cheaper, more manoeuvrable, and lighter boards made of fibreglass and foam became available. The teenaged war-babies and baby boomers headed to the beach in droves to enjoy the manoeuvrability and stunts made possible by the new boards. Surfing has a unique and often powerful appeal which derives from the confluence of several elements: adrenalins, skill, and high paced manoeuvring which are all set against a naturally unpredictable backdrop and an organic environment that is, by turns, graceful and serene, violent and formidable. Surfing is often viewed as less of a sports activity and more of a lifestyle. The surf culture found increasing expression with mass-production of surf fashions, of related music and, later, with the booming surf magazine and movie industries in the 1960s. There is often a fanatical enthusiasm found in surfing’s devotees. Surfing Magazine, founded in the 1960s when surfing had gained popularity with teenagers, used to say that if the surfies were at their offices of employment and someone yelled "Surf's up!" the offices would suddenly be empty.(1) -Ron Price with thanks to (1) Peter Eglington, “The History of Surfing,” internet site, 13/2/’10.
The activity, the vocation and/or avocation of writing exploded into my life in the 1990s and 2000s. I was on the cusp of the war-baby and baby-boomer generations, born as I was in July 1944. The leisure-time activity of writing really got going in my life after I retired from FT, PT and volunteer/casual work in the years 1999 to 2005. I did not head to the beach as the surfers did in droves back in the 1950s and 1960s to enjoy the manoeuvrability and stunts made possible by the new boards; I headed to my study to engage in: reading, research and independent scholarship as well as to enjoy the pleasures of solitude and writing.
Writing has a unique and often powerful appeal which derives from the confluence of several elements: adrenalin, skill, and a possible high-paced manoeuvring of words which are all set against a naturally unpredictable backdrop and an organic environment that is, by turns, graceful and serene, as well as violent and formidable. The violence, of course, is subtle and the formidable nature of the exercise is unlike that of surfing. Writing is often viewed as less of a leisure-time activity and more of a lifestyle. A writer’s culture has found increasing expression since Gutenburg made possible the mass-production of books and as modern history advanced century by century with the print and electronic media making the writing industry a more pervasive and a quintessentially global phenomenon. There is often a fanatical enthusiasm found among writing’s devotees. That is certainly the case with me especially in the last decade as I have been able to surf the net. -Ron Price with thanks to (1) Peter Eglington, “The History of Surfing,” internet site, 13/2/’10.
_________________
married for 42 years, a teacher for 35 and a Baha'i for 50 |
|
