now i am awesome

the truth is my weekend ruled! i am sorry for all of you (mom and dad) who had a horrible thanksgiving and i feel for you, i really do, but i got to see tommie holden AND i went surfing! thanksgiving was full of thanks, you know for the turkey, family, being alive, friends, people who are willing to take in homeless teenagers for a couple nights, beach cruiser bikes, and above all SURFING!!! i am not a real person yet, mainly because i haven't actually ridden a legit wave yet (give it time) but i am one step closer to real person-ness.
thursday morning tommie holden came and picked me up so we could go have some turkey with him and his girlfriends family, of which they were hilarious. i don't know of many other nicer people than chris's (tommies girlfriend) parents, so welcoming and happy. the dad restores old wooden boats, he took us to the shop that used to be his (before he retired) and the boats that were there were soooooooo nice!!! mostly tommie and i just walked around starry eyed asking questions like; "what is this one?", "how did you get this one?", "audrey hepburn rode in this one?", "how old is this one?", "what?! from 1914?", "completely original?". my favorite part of that whole experience was when we asked about the prices and he started throwing numbers around like hot cakes... "oh this one, yah this one was about 100,000", "oh and that one... i would give it a rough estimate of... ahh about 300,000", "that one, oh that one was only about 70,000." just like it was nothin. you know, house payment or a boat? naturally a boat and let's pay for it in change from my piggie bank that i just had lying around. we felt like little kids in a candy store, but a REALLY nice candy store. he definitely knows his way around those boats though, they were also worth every penny. if the pictures work you will see what i am talking about.
i stayed at chris and tommies that night in denea's (chris's daughter) room, the bed was soooo comfortable and her room was incredible, so many colors and pictures. i didn't get to meet her but i bet she is one awesome person. i woke up early that morning (tommie beat me though, he was up way before i was) we made a dang good breakfast cause you aint nothin with out a good breakfast, checked the forecast (or i guess you could say the surf cast :)), loaded up the boards, the beach cruisers, the lunch, the frisbee, and the ukulele. i felt hard core on that hour long ride to new smyrna beach. we got there and parked in the town, pulled out the bikes and hopped on. oh and you had to hold the board with one hand and steer with the other, for a person who has not ridden a bike for a couple years it was not that easy of a task at first (they say you never forget how to ride a bike but i think i might be the exception cause i was SSSHHHAAKKEYYYY). i broke tommies number one rule; "always look cool" cause i did not look that cool at first. luckily i got the hang of it and we were off. we rode for about a mile, parked, slammed down a sandwich, waxed the boards, put on the wetsuits and just went for it. it was a very terrifying experience at first cause i really had no idea what to expect, luckily it got better. tommie caught his perfect wave and was just as happy as could be by that time, i was drowning while he was doing his thing so i didn't get to see it.
i took a good old beating for a while and then we went in, played some frisbee, ate some food, and went back out. by this time the surf had died down a little so luckily it was more in my element and i felt a lot more comfortable. i really need to learn a couple basic skills though, you know like diving under a wave, paddling, standing up, you know just the basics. i played around in the waves there and stood up (for about 1.1 seconds but still)!
once that party ended we hopped out of the wetsuits, ditched the boards and went for a bike ride. we went as far as we could then we had to cut through a marsh to get back to our boards (that we lovingly left stranded in a complete strangers care). at any rate is was about the best time i have had in a long time. good old tommie, what an amazing man he is. i am so thankful for him.
he let me borrow his beach cruiser for the next two weeks so that is even better cause now i am mobile! careful everyone, crazy girl on a bike!!! wahooo. everyone is jealous cause now i can go anywhere faster! i have also vowed i will pick up mountain biking when i get home. i will also get better at riding a bike, i don't want to run into a parked car again, that was embarrassing (i didn't mention it before but ya, that is no longer a thing i am wondering what it would feel like. the car was right in front of an overcrowded bar so all the people who saw me were drunk, trust me, the whole bar saw me!)