The Chinese word “Tai Chi Chuan” means supreme ultimate boxing.  Is Tai chi a sedentary exercise relegated to the old or is it a potent, modern, martial arts system?  Is Tai Chi taught correctly or is it the basis of western boxing that prizefighters use to make millions of dollars annually?  A long time ago, the Chinese nobility used to promote free-for-all fights because they did not have the internet or planes to take them on vacation.   The nobility chose several martial arts systems to be part of the aristocracy or “Internal sect” and they became what is now known as the internal systems. These systems that the aristocracy chose for their own are, Hsing-I,  Pa-kua,  and Tai Chi.  Only  Tai  Chi Chuan made it to the United States.  The internal systems are first and foremost an exercise system to be done solo every day to promote cardiovascular health.   If a student practices the movements of the internal systems daily,  within twenty years they become a potent system of self-defense.   The reason a student practices every day is to integrate the movements into ganglionic memory and install a no-mind response when confronted by an adversary. 

The fundamentals of Tai Chi Chuan are:

The idea

The steps

The five postures.

The idea behind Tai Chi is the oscillation of a string or the sine wave.   When a string is plucked,  it bounces back and vibrates, so it is with Tai Chi as in saber fencing.  Lunge, Parry, and redouble. When an enemy attacks, a student parries, and punches, and if they miss they redouble.  This action must be a no-mind response to be effective.

Tai Chi Chuan is also known as “One step boxing.”     In boxing a practitioner usually only needs one step to carry out their admonition.   This is why Tai Chi is known as an exercise for the old because old people can’t move around or dance like they could when they were young.  The steps in Tai Chi are:

Waist drawback stance

Toe step

Archery posture

Heel stance

Step to the side

The waist draw-back stance or posture puts sixty percent of the weight on the back leg in an on-guard stance.  This is a comfortable posture that readies a person to step forward and punch.  The toe step is when a practitioner brings back one leg in front of the other and is akin to the cat stance in Okinawan Karate.  The toe stance is the parry.   From the toe stance, a boxer accelerates his or her mass forward with a punch or strike to an archery stance.   In archery stance, a student has sixty percent of his or her weight on the front foot.   This is the one step.   After entering the archery stance a student follows steps on the rear foot to enter into the waist drawback stance again.   The heel stance is a specific posture used when a boxer has a reach advantage.   They put sixty percent of their weight on the rear foot, and forty percent on the front foot sitting on the heel and lunged forward into an archery stance to deliver a punch. Step to the side starts from the waist drawback and a boxer steps one foot to the side and brings the other foot to cat stance to evade a lunge punch or flurry of punches.

The steps are all of Tai Chi Chuan.   Everything else derives from the steps.  The feature that makes a punch powerful is the acceleration of the body mass coincident with the punch.  An expert boxer can deliver their body weight in a punch in the blink of an eye.

In all of Tai Chi, there exist 108 postures.   Only five make up the basis of the art which evolved from the martial art postures of the Kodiak bear.   Tai Chi is the art of the bear.  This is why orthodox practitioners use the palm.   Bears do not have fingers and use their palm.   Human beings should use their first instead.  The fist causes more damage than the palm. The five basic postures used in Tai Chi are:

The single whip

Brush the knee and press

Fan penetrates back

Hands build clouds

The expansive push or step up and punch.

There exist many more and some instructors place more emphasis on some rather than others.  The most lethal postures in Kung Fu include tai chi.   The five basic postures make up the whole of Western boxing.   All the boxers in stadiums, or on TV, utilize tai chi to make money.

The single whip is also known as the jab.   From a ready position, a boxer moves his weight to an archery stance and accelerates his hand in a straight fashion.   Then he or she initiates the follow-step.

Brush knee and press is the same as an overhand right.   A boxer circles his left hand to brush away a kick to the knee and circles the other hand in a looping punch.  A boxer can eliminate the circling left hand if not necessary.   Then a boxer follows steps up to the waist drawback stance. 

Fan penetrate back is the most used posture in all the martial arts.   It is also known as the straight right hand.   A boxer waves his left hand upwards to block a looping left or overhand right,  then he or she punches outward with the right standing fist to the face.

Cloud build hands are the same as bumping in a White crane or flapping in the style of the phoenix.    A boxer circles both hands, one clockwise and the other in a counterclockwise fashion like he or she is building clouds with their hands.   The effect is a short hook to the face that Muhammed Ali tuned to perfection.   The open hand is slightly faster than the fist and in Cloud build hands a boxer uses the open hand.   A person can use the fist if necessary.   Use an archery stance and initiate a follow-step..   This is one-step boxing.

The expansive push is what all bears use initially before they engage.   Step forward into an archery stance and push forward directly with two open hands.   A boxer can use their fist.   This is the Tai Chi version of crushing used in Hsing-i.   It is directed against the body, more specifically the solar plexus…   A person can use step up and punch instead which is the same as the spear hand in Pa-kua and Okinawan Karate.

These are the basics of Tai chi.   There exist only two leg movements in Tai Chi.   They are kicking against the kick and the lotus kick. Kick against a kick is used against a kicking expert who dances around and throws kicks at your knees or head.   In kick against the kick,   when an enemy lifts a foot, any foot to kick, a Tai Chi boxer snap kicks their groin.   The only time a tai chi boxer uses a kick is to kick another foot expert in the genitals.   The other kick is the lotus kick which is the same as the crane kick in Soft Wing Chun.   It is called the lotus kick because if you connect, the adversary falls asleep.  Swing your extended leg in a big circle that connects with the head.    When your hands hurt or you are holding a weapon, a boxer can use the lotus kick.

Like stated before there exist 108 movements to Tai Chi.   One of the movements is using your head to beat someone into unconsciousness.   This movement is not recommended.   Another called the shoulder strike is for advanced students to use their shoulders to strike a grappler.   There exist many others in many other tai chi styles.

The other basic movements of  Tai Chi  Chuan are:

Send tiger back to mountain-  a huge hook

Repel the tiger-  the hookercut directed against the groin

Slanting flight- an open-handed backhand directed against the throat

Step up and form seven stars.   A cross-hand punch with both hands to the carotid arteries against a grappler

Golden Cockerel hangs on the ears-   A straight hook simultaneously with both open hands to the ears meant to deafen an opponent

Backstep the monkey – The only posture where you defend against a karate expert with a flurry moving backward.   This is the only movement in the martial arts meant to be done backward

This is the system of Yang Cheng Fu.  The author practices Hsing-I and Pa-ku instead.   There is simply too much to know.  Hsing-I is consecutive step boxing, and Pa-Kua is circling step boxing.   There is too much to master in a lifetime.   Choose one internal system and become adept in it.  The main benefit is cardiovascular health.  If a boxer does the postures on both sides religiously, he or she becomes ambidextrous.   The perfection of the self is paramount in the quest for the TAO as outlined in the I-Ching.   

DISCLAIMER: The following discourse has no basis in reality and anyone implicated or implied is nothing more than imagination far away.

Father Wracker was a distant father.  He never said much and when he came home from teaching disadvantaged students Business at LACC, he would sit and smoke cigarettes and have a red can of Coca-Cola.   Sometimes the Wracks would wake up late at night and tell him to go to sleep put out his cigarette and lead him to his bedroom.    He was a part-time insurance broker and no one ever thought so much of him.  He had few friends and when they appeared, he and Mother Wracker would fix them a fine dinner and then sit in the green living room and drink brandy.   He was never there much unless someone needed him; the Wracks wondered where he spent all his free time.   He would disappear on business trips for a week or more and show up again and begin again.   The family would celebrate Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter and go to midnight mass sometimes on the Navidad.   The Wracks wondered where all the time went and then it was over.  

The holidays are here once again, bringing poignant memories that one cannot forget and the alone are morose.  Everything has changed.   Sometimes he would come home early and ask the Wracks to borrow his CO2 bb pistol and he would practice in the yard shooting a soda can, the yard with one white rose.   Grandmother passed away and, in his mind, the Wracks see here in Finland, she now is on her own.   When the Wracks returned from his education, he got an aneurysm and the Wracks rushed him to the hospital, and he was saved.  The world would get twenty more years from him.  He wouldn’t go on business trips anymore, and the endless years of eating amphetamine and smoking cigarettes while on assignment finally caught up to him.   The powers that be gave him an assignment as an analyst at a firm with a standard name so he could derive a pension and retire with some money.  A friend of his got into a jam in a far-off place and Father Wracker gave his entire pension to an unscrupulous jailor and that man came home.  When he retired, the firm gave him a gold Rolex watch and he never wore it, and the Wracks inherited it and it stays in his drawer today.  One holiday dinner while the Wracks were clearing dishes, he sat down and Father Wracker stuck his index finger into his forearm and said, 

Never join the CIA, let someone else do it.  

He never said anything more and his greyish-black eyes focused and pin pricked and that was that.

Years go by and the Wracks has gone away and visit his parents from time to time with his blond-haired wife.  They left tranquil hills because the location was too hot and moved to Indian Wells, near Indio to watch a house for a gentrified man who needed someone to live in his mansion.  When he was down there, once, he asked the Wracks to take him for chemotherapy.   He developed skin cancer of the head and face from witnessing countless atomic explosions and the Wracks waited as he vomited into a brown grocery bag after a treatment.   He also developed hypertension and nothing in the allopathic armory works.   The elite decided that Father Wracker needed a kidney transplant and he died, and his wife didn’t want to live alone and cursed everyone around her.  They say that they use you as long as you are effective, and when you know too much, they get rid of you.  So it goes.

The time has gone away, and another generation is safe from the ravages of the bad guys.  Whatever race or religion they are or what they think is immaterial.  We were saved and the world goes on like nothing ever happened, and there is no money because they cannot acknowledge your existence without admitting coercion.   The Wracks wonders if there is anything in Swiss bank accounts because, for a wage earner, everything helps.   Before he died, he said to Wracks in passing, “For a long shot use a 7.62”.  The Argentine national government would never let him emigrate because he didn’t have enough money.

A long time has passed, and The Wracks sits looking out a window. The holidays are upon us and the Wracks have a son.    All seems good.   There is one thing and one thing only the Wracks has on his bucket list.  He doesn’t want to see the French museum or the holy city of Saint Petersburg.   He doesn’t want to visit Cambodia and view the resting place of the beloved Borte Kalel at Angor Wat.   He hopes the government will give him access to the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and kneel, and say a prayer and thank God that his generation was delivered from evil.  

It was and it is and the Wracks have a ride surfing.  The Getty has a white and neon yellow Volkswagen bus of 1959 vintage, configured for trips.  An Abarth tuned exhaust system gives the 1300 cc rig ten more horsepower and top speed flat out on a level straight of about sixty miles per hour.  No one knows how the Getty comes up with these concoctions but he does, again and again.   On a Saturday, bright and early, Getty, Kool, and the Wracks will venture south for a two-hour drive to Diego.  In the winter, in California, for some reason unknown, Diego has the most consistent surf on the California Coast except for Steamer Lane in Santa Cruz.   In Leucadia and Encinitas,  any swell with a north bent fills in there, and even in the summer, there are small wavelets to ride.   The Wracks planned to live here but it never transpired and this is why. 

The Getty and Kool show up around six o’clock in the morning and as always Kool waits in the car and smokes.   Getty arouses Wracks from slumber by pounding on his window, and toast with an egg and two dollars of gas money get the Wracks a seat in the back, with the boards, to go surfing where there are waves. Six dollars fill the small rear tank.   In California, somewhere, waves worth riding, happen every day, especially if the intrepid are willing to drive, or even fly there.  Hawaii is windy and rainy and the reason everyone flocks to this island retreat is because the water is a warm seventy degrees plus.  In California, fifty-degree water is commonplace, and the wind can blow very cold.  The Wracks throws one of his second-hand boards in the back along with his blue Nat Pro wetsuit.   The boys are smoking and whatever up front and toss the Wracks a lit nib when they are done with it.  Smoke billows out the windows.  A police car pulls up alongside the bright yellow van and Getty waves to him and he waves back.  Past the endless refineries and smell of non-olfactory money, the three find themselves in Diego, and they turn off at Encinitas.

We are going to Moonlight says Kool,  Yah Deh.  A left breaking off a rock reef, the best in Diego

I heard it is good too, says Getty.  The Fonz and Dick surf it all the time.

The Fonz never told me about it says the Wracks, and the two up fronts look at each other. 

 Moonlight is a street sign that stands in front of a beach shrouded by a strand of tall Pine trees.  No one can see the beach; a traveler must meander down the path to get there.  The Wracks guesses that all good things are obscured this way.  After the Getty parks, near the street sign, He gets out and a tall, blond head appears out of the bush.  The Getty goes and speaks with him, shakes his head, and saunters back to the car. 

We can’t surf here, says the Getty.   We have the Wracks with us.   We will have to come back some other day in the winter.   Right now, the left reef is six feet and glassy.

My backside is not so good anyway say the Wracks, I am sorry.  I have trouble dropping in on left tubing waves.

We are going to Del Mar, says Getty, but first the seven-eleven. 

A tall Anglo-Saxon man the Encinitas Seven Eleven.  The Wracks buys a tall Slurpee in cherry, his favorite flavor.   The Getty and Kool buy bags of junk of every make and description.  They eat half of everything and throw the rest out the window.  Getty eats half of the microwaved hot dogs.  Kool has his favorite, a pastrami sandwich and a Heineken beer. 

You are not eighteen yet say the Wracks, How did you buy that beer?

I have a fake I.D. says Kool, you can obtain one for five hundred bucks from a professional.  Yeah!

Del Mar is good today, with about four to six-foot peaks, breaking on a rocky sand bar.   Wracks practices going left on his six-foot eight-inch square tail with two round side fins inspired by Craig Wilson.  Ing shaped it in his garage. 

Do you like the three fins ask the Getty.

It doesn’t spin out and has more draw says the Wracks.

The session is over and the mid-day sun brings the predominant westerly on-shore wind that slightly blows everything out.

Let’s head home says Getty

The two light up in front and the Wracks have a Pall-Mall cigarette in the back and flick the ash through the side windows. The roaring Abarth exhaust system permeates the environment with a blaring sound and the Yellow VW heads on home on the Freeway and the Wracks fall asleep.

The big pine tree in front of the Bacon Way residence reminds the Wracks that he is home.

Time to dislodge says the Getty

I will throw my stuff on the ivy says the Wracks.

We are going to the Rainbow tonight, says the Getty. Want to tag along?

Don’t have any money says the Wracks, and I have to study

Plenty of blow says Kool, and girls.  Yeah!

I have to stay with my grandmother tonight, my father is on another business trip and my mother is working. We are going to have chicken with parsley and garlic.

Suit yourself says the Getty, See you next time the swell comes up, and they put the van in reverse, turn one hundred eighty degrees, and dart away.

Tranquil Hill is nice in the winter.  Never too hot and never too cold, and green and grown in.   A single white rose grows in the planter, in the back, the rest have died off.  The Wracks has a cup of Yuban coffee brewed from a percolator setup along with a Pall Mall Gold King with a filter and he loses himself in a book.  I can’t wait till next time; I just can’t wait.  

Overview

Building a hydrogen bomb is quick and easy. Forty years ago Time magazine ran an expose on how to build a cheap atomic bomb.   The difficult part lies in the effort to obtain enriched uranium or plutonium to be used as a detonator.  The critical mass of plutonium lies within forty to sixty pounds of enriched fuel.  If such a mass comes together in one place, it begins to fission.  The fission reaction builds to a crescendo and the fission nucleus becomes a fissile.  A hydrogen bomb can be ignited with a fissile. The color of fast neutrons screaming from a fissile pile demonstrates a sky-blue light of amazing intensity.

Fission devices

An atomic bomb can be either a fat boy device or a thin man device.  A fat boy device builds as crescent wedges of plutonium that assemble into a sphere.  The wedges drive together with the force of an explosive blasting cap. The Thin Man device is designed as three rods of enriched plutonium that fit in a tube.  The three remain separated until driven together by a blasting cap.  The thin man design remains the most reliable of the atomic bomb designs and the Russians use this design exclusively in their atomic devices.

Other ways can coax subcritical masses of plutonium to fission.  Submitting enriched plutonium masses to intense pressures forces the plutonium to fission.  Spinning spheres of plutonium at high rotations per minute stimulates plutonium to fission.  The half-life of plutonium is around 5280 years at which time a plutonium atom degrades and emits a slow neutron.  The capture area of slow neutrons in a plutonium atom is small so that random degradations do not initiate a chain reaction.  Crushing or spinning plutonium increases the capture area as an arithmetic function of pressure or when spinning as an arc inscribed by a rotating mass with radius alpha. By artificial means such as the aforementioned, subcritical masses can be cajoled into a chain reaction.

Fusion bomb design.

Classically, an atom of deuterium fused with an atom of tritium becomes an atom of helium with a liberated mass deficit in energy.  The truth exists to the effect that all alkali metals in the periodic table of elements can be fusion fuel if the conditions of fusion are met. A hydrogen bomb simply stated; is an atomic bomb with hydrogen surrounding the fission mass.  The hydrogen can be in the form of tanks of gas or as a hydride. Hydrogen gas remains the most stable form of hydrogen to be used in a fusion device. Now they have hydride.  Pure lithium metal undergoes atomic fusion and the calculated mass deficit of fusion surpasses the mass deficit of hydrogen fusion into helium.  The next generation of fusion devices will use lithium metal as a fusion substrate.  With the knowledge of the above parameters, miniaturization of fusion devices becomes possible and within the realm of plausibility.  Beryllium also functions as a fusion substrate.  Encapsulating a fissile with a Beryllium sphere creates relativistic conditions.

A Poor man’s hydrogen bomb

Creating an explosive with lithium hydride and magnesium possibly assembles a cheap hydrogen bomb.  The Gibbs free energy of magnesium oxidation might be of sufficient intensity to approach relativity and induce a fusion event as the fusion enthalpy of hydrogen has been exceeded.    Encapsulating the mass with Beryllium might augment the necessary environment for hydride fusion and stimulate a chain reaction.  This is like putting gunpowder in a bamboo cylinder like Genghis Khan.

Hope

God gave man the gift of intelligence and thought to separate him from animals and beasts.  The strict policing and governing over enriched uranium and plutonium production ensures no criminal to access the basis for explosives of incredible magnitude. Atomic explosives heat the environment.    As is the plight of human existence, small lithium bombs on portable handheld missiles will soon enter the theatre of modern warfare. The burden of the next generation will be the humane and constructive use and application of nuclear power in an atmosphere of permissiveness and proliferation.  

Everything in life is symmetrical, periodical, and cyclic.  The intrinsic forces that form all beings are the same. The man searches for the parameters that define existence.  He searches for the universal field equation and it eludes him.  Perhaps someone thinks we are not ready, or deserving.  From the green and deep forests to the big fields and pastures to the blue expansive ocean, and the small atom, it is all the same.   The same laws that govern nature in the form of exponent e to the logarithmic expanses of the electromagnetic spectrum, to the vibrating quintesimal existence of matter, there exists one rule, one paradigm to rule us all to show mankind the way to the next star.

Fusion enthalpy is the relativity that permits the change of matter to energy.  Fusion enthalpy is defined as the mass number times the speed of light squared.  This is the relation that fuels the lifespan of stars and gives humankind a home for now.   All elements undergo fusion to a point, then they undergo fission and the cycle repeats and energy is neither created nor destroyed.   The sun mainly feeds on hydrogen fusion because it is the most abundant element and has the lowest fusion enthalpy.  As all the hydrogen is used up, the sun will transit to lithium, then to beryllium, and finally the transition metal series when the sun glows a deep red.  When the star exceeds the maximum fusion enthalpy, the weak gravitational force causes the mass to collapse, and the heavy mass undergoes fission with a big bang and the cycle repeats anew.   When energy transits a certain distance, not yet calculated, it slows down and becomes matter which then coalesces and eventually forms a star.  Radiant energy when it slows down becomes hydrogen, helium, and lithium and the cycle begins anew.  The interstellar dust that plagues unmanned space exploration is merely energy that has slowed down and become mass again. We can’t see because the process is slow but in the lifespan of a galaxy, a million years is but a twinkling light.  If we find a way to slow down radiation, we can produce mass for our fusion reactors as most energy that slows down becomes hydrogen.  Fusion reactions flame out and fission reactions go critical, and this is why we cannot contain fusion, as of now.

An atomic bomb can be initiated with a fissile.   A critical is not necessary.  A fissile is all that is necessary to ignite hydride to fusion.  Once fusion initiates, a layer of lithium, and then a layer of beryllium provide the fusion enthalpy for ignition to super mass.   In this way, atomic explosives can be made small for deposition in a stringent way and deployed judiciously.

  It is the weak force, and not the zillions of subatomic particles that delight physicists that holds the key to relativity.  The force of gravity is a wave and particle just like light and is produced by the intrinsic vibrations of mass and is the key to transposition and voyage to the next star.  Gravity waves are produced just like Maxwell Ian’s magnetic waves and radiate out from the photon in a different plane.   To produce gravity, a scientist accelerates protons to the speed of light, which then produces gravity in another plane, in relation to the quanta of energy evoking the change in mass.

I guess we are nearly there.  All that is needed is a little prayer in the hope the blind might come to their senses and see.    

The Wracks is at the big U.   They take the top ten percent of students in the United States.  The Wrack has a high SAT score.  He takes the hour-long bus ride from the suburbs every morning.  The monthly pass for students costs twenty-five dollars.  The bus is new and nice and air-conditioned and drops him off directly on the main campus.   He smokes cigarettes and drinks coffee to keep him going through four hours of classes and eight hours of homework each night.  Some of the older students don’t like him smoking and tell him so.  He sits on the steps of the hall opposite the main library and waits for classes and labs that occur sometimes three times a week.  He has another cigarette and disposes of it.   At five o’clock every day, he and his friend who studies Political Science go to the student union and the wracks have his dinner for 99 cents.   He buys a bowl of stew which is different every day and a pack of saltine crackers.  When he needs some sleep he sleeps in public in the plush chairs in the reading room of the student union.  He goes to school every morning at seven and comes home every night on the last bus at 9 fifty-five.  The days go by and he studies chemistry and genetics and whatever is necessary to get a degree. Hopefully, this work lands him a good job somewhere or at least in graduate school.  But it didn’t.

Sitting on the steps of the big Hall smoking, the Wracks notice that all the upper-class students dress in nice clothes, pair up with beautiful women, and go to a bar in town at lunch.   In the summer they fly on vacation, go skiing, and in the winter go to Hawaii.   The Wracks takes the six-week summer session that is so intense, that he can only take one.   Then he needs to rest.  The students who drive around in nice cars, and don’t show up for lectures, all get straight A’s in science. He sees the grades on the board every month.  With all his work, all he can earn is a B.  He wonders why.  He eventually sees, after he graduates, that the reason rich students are so gifted is because they buy the exams the night before taking them and have starving graduate students do their homework.  The most prestigious and important positions in society are occupied by rich criminals.  All the doctors a person depends on for their lives and all attorneys people use to keep them out of prison are unscrupulous cheaters.  Rich mothers and fathers buy licensing exams for their children a year beforehand, and they memorize them, and then take the test to become licensed professionals.  In addition, in the book “The Challenge of Democracy”, the text states that one-half of all political appointments is favoritism.   The Wracks think it always was this way, no matter what society.  Our nation created by geniuses as a nation under God is run by criminals and mental defectives who are related to the politicians in power

Can it be said that the author is a non-productive worker, this may be true.   The way the Wracks think to rectify this condition is to make all certifying examinations and licensing Boards public domain in a huge tome for all to read and have access to.  All a student needs to do is purchase a book with a compendium of all the latest test questions, study them, and pass the boards.   This way everyone is on equal footing.   This is how they do it in Mexico. 

One of the greatest Americans that ever lived was Thomas Jefferson.   He hung a huge two-hundred-pound wheel of cheddar cheese from the roof and lived on it.   His water supply was eventually contaminated with arsenic and he went blind.   They did not have water filtration devices in those days.  He is the one who wrote the song “Country Road”, and when he was blind,  he trained horses to take him into town and back every day until he died.  It is his idea, and his only to make the practice of Law available to all Americans in good standing who can pass the bar.  This way the forces in power cannot stack the judiciary with elitists.   Medicine should be the same way.  Instead of begging, and stealing to get into an opulent medical school.  Any American who passes the board examinations should be allowed to matriculate to an internship and get their license.  In medicine, the house staff has the final say if an individual is to be certified, to be ethical enough to practice medicine.  It has to be that way.

It is imperative and critical that a nation be guided by the appropriate people, not the best porno actors. It is nearly impossible to seize military control of a nation unless the elite can stack the judiciary and the medical sector.   If we the people ensure that professionals are smart enough, ethical enough, and strong enough, no person or military can unseat the government, and the United States can continue to function as One Nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

I am taking you to the beach today, says Mother Wracks, they called me in. Put on this shirt and they will think you are one of them.

What is it mother, asks Wracks, She says it is a hand-woven silk Hawaiian shirt sent by your uncle Duke.   Silk is the most comfortable fabric to wear and quite expensive, says Mother.

She drives up to the Bu in her blue Chevrolet Impala station wagon and lets the Wracks out with a brown bag lunch.

Stay close to Mickey says mom,   he won’t let anyone hurt you.  See you at five.

In the golden days, the Bu was a festival.   They played volleyball in the cove and sat around and smoked but most importantly, went surfing.  It seems the Bu was more consistent in those days but now it is long ago.  Hodad built a thatched hut at the first point to live in and would sit in the shade and play his guitar.  The only thing he would eat was hot dogs and he would give Wracks a piece sometimes.   Johnny told on him and the police made him tear it down so there was no place to go with crazy Kate.  He and Kate were a sight to behold him in a floral shirt and Kate running around in a wetsuit and surfing first point.  The Wracks sit and watch.   The best surfer to surf the Point was Lance and no one could figure out how he connected the points and he wouldn’t tell anyone how.  Then he stopped surfing the Bu and no one knew why. Rumor had it that he got drafted and a psycho general with an English name made him surf in Viet Nam in the middle of an artillery barrage.

One day on the beach the Wracks saw a girl with long brown hair with the briefest Bikini he had ever seen and the other girls would wear small swimsuits in loud colors.  The bikini she wore was brown and handmade and crocheted and blended into her dark tan.

Look away, says the girl in the brief bikini.

But you don’t have any clothes on, says the Wracks.

Look away she repeats.

Wrack can never forget that girl with steel grey eyes who now cuts her hair in a crew cut and hosts a successful talk show.  John, who would only show up when the surf was big and parade around the parking lot in a silver bathrobe, somehow got run over in that parking lot and never showed up again.  Maybe he crossed the line once too often.  They say he is from an extremely wealthy family but the people at Tranquil Hills got him.

There was an oriental man named Don who was the best nose rider in California along with the Huntington kid and he earned the name: the masochist.  He was a black belt in Shotokan and Jujitsu.

The beach would cry out to Mickey, “The masochist is in a fight again”,   and Mickey would have to go and break up the fracas.  Only Mickey was big enough and trained well enough to stop him. A girl they call Lava Girl had bright red hair yellowed by the sun.  She would come to the beach in a white full-length swimsuit and spend all day wading in the tide pools collecting things.   She brings things up to the wall like shells, crabs, sea anemones, and bric-a-brac and shows them to people.  She never smiled, not once.  A woman only smiles when they know someone loves them.  The Wrack wanders about trying to find someplace to stay.  A beautiful woman with black hair and violet eyes feeds him bits of a sandwich and Frito corn chips.  She is the only girl not in a bikini.  She was extremely nice to him and her given name was Gidget.  She eventually became an actress and married Richard Burton.

This exists as a compendium of the days at the beach when camaraderie existed and people worked together as one.  Those days are gone but a distant memory in the mind of a disgruntled worker.  Fall is here and the seasons roll around again and again, and the days go by like pages in a book. Time is a parameter like space and distance and becomes an engram in a future happening.  The Wracks is happy to relay the world as it was before the darkness overcame the nation.  His beautiful Hawaiian shirt was stolen, as was his tie-dyed denim shirt his grandmother made him.  He will never know and everyone thinks it is better that way.

It is fall and the cool offshores blow from the canyons out to the ocean.  Alone as always Wracks stands inside the North Gate of the Bixby Ranch and looks down the cliff and out to sea.  A triangular reef in the middle of a kelp forest breaks left, and right too, but the left is better.  Harvest season begins in October with the thirty-first at the end to summon in the holidays.  On the way up, Rincon presents as a pecuniary three feet at best and the Wracks wonders why Tarantula Point is at least fifteen feet and bigger on the hourly sets.  The wave throws out roundly and the seaweed rises on the face on the smaller sets making the reef look like an undulating forest of brownish green in deep cold water.   The water here burns the face with coldness, and ice cream headaches are commonplace.   Maybe it is because the water off Point Conception and the bigger Government point is at least one thousand feet deep.  Surfers who live up here say that Government Point can hold any size swell nature has to offer, but Tarantula Point, situated on the north face of Government Point is the biggest.  Some say that Perkos produces bigger waves but it is in the south ranch, on the south side of Government Point.  Up here in the north ranch,  the waves produce a crack as the peak hits the ocean and the offshore wind stimulates a spinning tube.   At point conception, the protuberance that pushes out the farthest west of any place in California, the winds can change at any moment, and the rains, when they come, fall hard and are relentless.  So here, just inside the North gate at the ranch, the Wracks ponders going out by himself and catching a few lefts before heading home.  He has brought a seven-foot eleven-inch pintail gun with slots in the tail, shaped by Dean and on loan to the Wracks from his brother.  He will wear a Oneil spring suit underneath with a farmer John lower so the body has double the thickness of the neoprene.  Another huge set pours through and the left breaking wave ends in a channel with easy paddle and access to the peak.  The Wracks is trying to summon up some courage to go out, by himself for an hour or two.  In the meantime he watches four-inch-long tarantulas, slowly, methodically crossing the road to get somewhere probably to mate before the cold winter season ahead.   They are big, brown, and have short hair over the entirety of their bodies.  The fangs on their mouth are one inch long, but you can pick them up and they don’t bite.  It seems they move under the spell of an unseen drummer.  The Wracks set the tarantula down and look out to sea again.  Another huge wave comes out of the deep water ocean, breaks, and finalizes and the Wracks thinks he will have to flip a coin to decide whether to go out.  A tall rancher appears out of nowhere and salutes the Wracks.

I hope you are aware that thirty-foot-long great white sharks patrol just outside the surf line.  If you go out there you are taking your life in your hands, says the Rancher. 

I am deciding says the Wracks.

Decide all you want,  it is your ass on the line out there.  Don’t say I didn’t warn you says the Rancher and he waves goodbye and saunters off. 

I decided says the Wracks and the rancher waves his right hand up in the air without turning and walks away.

The fact that immense great white sharks lurk out in the water is not the only thing that scares the Wracks.  The water is incredibly cold and predatory sharks do not frenzy until the water reaches seventy degrees.  The fact is that the Wracks are alone and no one wanted to spend four hours driving on a freeway to have their head freeze off in deep seawater. Hawaii is a lot warmer. The Wracks gives up.  He drives the borrowed Pinto runabout out through the north gate gets on Highway One and drives down the long thirty-minute hill that burns out brakes to start transiting on his way home.  He pulls out a Pall Mall Gold, pushes in the car lighter, and ignites the cigarette.   The cigarette will give the Wracks two hours of stimulation so he can drive without stopping, possibly time for another cigarette.  The scenery is brown before the rains, and the highway pushes outward in the distance with not a person around. The freeway looks like an endless ribbon in the distance.   The Wracks turn on the radio, find an FM rock station, and turn the unit up loud.  The Pinto has a long range on a full tank of gas and at seventy miles per hour he will be home in three hours.  He smokes and the radio plays and he passes El Capitan which is completely flat and finally in Goleta he knows he will make it home.  Rincon is blown out now and Highway One stretches south into Ventura.   He thinks he can make it on one full tank of gas and the gauge shows slightly less than one-third.  He passes the nuclear-made tunnel and approaches the county line then the Bu and finally up Moonrise Boulevard to home.  He has spent eight hours on the road and youth is vitality and wasted on the young and this was a long time ago and then some.  The Wracks do not surf anymore or own a surfboard.   His wet suits sit in the closet unused.   He lives in Northern California where they grow grapes,  looks out the window and wonders where all the time has gone. The air is cool in Northern California by October and Halloween heralds another season beginning and the year ebbing.  In the small yellow room with a stereo he looks around and wonders and thanks God for another day. 

“bonk, bonk bonk,” goes the knuckle against the glass window in Wrack’s room. “Who is outside my window at three in the morning,” asks Wracks.  “Bonk, Bonk, Bonk, meet me outside,” says BG.  “bonk, bonk, and bonk, it is me BG.” Says BG.  “Where is my dog,” asks Wracks. “I gave Punkin a milk bone and put him to sleep,” says BG.  “How did you get in my house,” asks Wracks who now is wide awake. “I reached through the dog door and opened it up,” explains BG. “I did not want to wake your parents so I put Punkin to bed and came around to your window.  Meet me in the back.”   “I have to put on some pants,” says Wracks, “give me a minute.”  Wracks exits his room, walks down the hall, closes the hall door, and looks at the cushion where Punkin the house dog sleeps.  Punkin dozes upside down with a smile on his face and stirs when Wracks walks by.   He opens his eyes, makes a whining noise, and goes back to sleep.  Wracks lets BG in the back door. BG wears a cardigan sweater and a large woodsman hat because it is winter even here in the best climate in North America on the west coast in December.  “The con is on,” says BG.  “It should be about eight to ten feet at the point and bigger at the indicator.”  “A new swell is hitting today and then it will drop tomorrow. The con is on and we should go now and be out in the water at sunup. The tide is low at two PM so the swell should peak in the morning and then drop with the tide. Let’s have breakfast.  What do you have? “   “We have eggs and toast,” says Wracks.  “I’ll have two eggs sunny side up and two pieces of toast with butter,” states BG. Wracks takes out a pan from underneath the stove, adds butter to the bottom of the pan turns on the electric range, and then drops four eggs into the melting and then sizzling butter.  Five minutes later the two sit at the kitchen table and have breakfast with two cups of Yuban fresh brewed coffee.  “It will not be as big as last time we went but it should be really good and have excellent shape. “  BG takes a draw on his coffee and finishes his eggs. “Bring some gas money and a pack of Pall Mall Gold.   We will need the nicotine.”  Says BG.  He rises from his chair, takes his dish, and sets it in the sink like he would at home.  “I’ll get my stuff, “says Wracks. The dog spins around right side up and yawns.  “I’ll see you out front, “says BG as he exits the back door in the dark in December as the mist from the ocean puts a shade and shadow on everything.   The dog goes back to sleep.  Wracks gets his jacket, his coke and bread, his paraffin bar, a pack of cigarettes, two dollars in change, and an O’Neill super suit, and goes out the back door into the garage.  A red diamond tail Nat Pro gun sits in the rafters and Wracks pulls it down with a hook and brings his gear outside the gate to underneath the big pine tree on Bacon Way as the street lights illuminate the misty air about the night. The green General Motors durabuilt engine econocar hatch sits open and Cool is loading his surfboard into the car between the seats.  “I invited him along, “says BG. “The more the merrier.”  Cool turns his head in a Mexican pullover with a hood and says,  “Hey brau,”  He then takes a draw on his cigarette and finishes a Heineken bear in a dark green bottle then heaves the empty into the neighbor’s yard.   “tonight you are going coffin,” says BG.  “Wait till I get my motorcycle helmet,” says Wracks.  Wracks dashes back into the back, into the garage extracts a black bell motocross helmet, and puts it on.   The three surfboards sit in the middle of the car separating the two driver seats and the back folds down into a large cargo area.  The gear of the three surfers sits on the right behind the “passenger side,   On the left will go Wracks coffin style. “Get in,” says BG, we have to get going.”  Wracks climbs into the cargo section, sits down facing back, and lays into the car like Count Dracula going to sleep.  BG closes the Hatchback over him, enters the car, ignites the ignition, puts the car into gear, and the three set off into history. Down Bacon, past Mellowman’s, onto Quez Lane and then Sunrise Avenue and Wracks looks up at the stars with his helmet on, chin strap on, and starts to fall asleep and the car accelerates like mad up Highway Number One.  “We are going to take the freeway today,” stipulates BG.  Up Pang Oh road the hatchback flies and the tires screech around the hairpin curves until the plateau and Freeway 101 appear as a green sign in the headlights at night perpendicular to the direction they were going.   Onto the onramp the car flies and BG accelerates until the car is in fourth gear and floored at night with the high beams on traveling on the 101 north.  Wracks awakens from sleep to see the stars and the car fills with smoke the windows are halfway down and the wind whips around Wrack’s helmet, the icy coolness bringing him back to life.   Within a short time, the three arrive at the junction, the junction of California Street and Highway One, and the ocean makes sounds and the moon sets largely on the ocean, illuminating the way to the little corner.   The little corner is the most consistent surf break in SB and gets a northwest, a hard north, and a straight west swell.  BG says today the swell sweeps in straight west and Wracks dozes coffin style in the hatchback.   Kool comes to life and says, “Let’s stop at the little clam for provisions.”  BG acknowledges and the car comes to a stop a half hour later at a little market, in a shack, set against s a hill with a gas station a half block away and the ocean rumbles and roars.  BG buys a hot dog and a pastrami sandwich heated in the store microwave.  Kool gets a sandwich and a bag of candy.   Wracks stay inside the car.   The two eat in silence.   Then BG says, “Let’s get going and be out in the water at sunrise.”  Kool acknowledges with a hand gesture.  BG ignites the car and heads out on the highway. Within ten minutes the three are at the little corner and pull into the big parking lot made especially for wave riders surrounding them with cyclone fencing and concrete blockades.   The night closes and the scene begins to lighten into a dark grey and morning arrives.  Eight cars are situated inside the parking area.  Die-hard wave riders who scoff a normal life sit in their cabs or hang out of the cargo doors of their vans waiting for first light.  Sharks cruise in the darkness and light sends them back out to deep water until the sun starts to set again.  Vans of ladies arrive to watch the wave riders surf the long thin tubular swells of the little corner.  The little corner breaks mostly on a west or northwest swell.  On these disturbances, the waves line up perpendicular to the point and break with ruler straightness in cylindrical almond-shaped tubes.  From the outer first point, three separate tube sections exist and a wave rider can situate his or herself strategically at each section to ride deep inside the wave.  The little corner holds a west swell up to fifteen feet, and then it starts to break erratically and closeout.  On a rare hard north swell that refracts off the Channel Islands onto the west-facing beach, thirty-foot waves will break for a morning and then disappear in the afternoon.  For these waves, people dedicate their lives and wait and watch for the perfect big day to arrive.  Once initiated, the little corner draws addicts from all over the coastal region of southern California.  Cool is the first out of the car. BG uncorks wracks who arises like a vampire from his tomb, shucks the helmet, and saunters with the other two down the little trail unto the base of the beach to catch a glimpse of what morning brings.   Today, the three are lucky, a solid ten to twelve-foot swell sends lines three to five at a time to break down the point into the bay.  The morning starts, the light arrives and a cool offshore breeze holds up the waves unto perfect spinning vortexes larger than ten feet and growling.  Cool screams out an unexplained word and runs back to the green hatchback along with BG.  The hatch opens, three wetsuits hang on the car and wracks share the bar of paraffin with the other two, and white streaks appear on the surface of the three long surfboards. With boards in hand, the three-run down the trail, through the flotsam and jetsam of wood and seaweed up to the point.  Timing the sets, they launch during a lull and are outside.   The sun comes up over the mountain interior to the little corner point and the day begins.  About twenty people ride the waves that morning and enough waves arrive to give each his or her own to enjoy.  When the sun rises directly overhead, the offshore wind stops and the ocean becomes completely smooth and glassy like a window pane.  Three wave sets pour through endlessly.  Within an hour the wind reverses into a westward flow and the ocean surface starts to roughen up and chop.  BG turns to Wracks and says, “We’re going in.” Wracks starts to paddle to shore without waiting for a wave to ride and then arrives on the beach by going along with the white water.    Cool waits up at the car. BG opens the car, Cool grabs a bag of candy and starts eating.  Wracks strips off his wetsuit and enters his druid robe.  Cool takes off his wetsuit then noticing some young ladies down the parking lot, starts dancing stark naked and singing.  The girls laugh and blush and Wracks stows his gear in the hatchback and modestly puts on his corduroy jeans and tee shirt and then his jacket.  BG smokes a Pall Mall Gold and drinks a Coke.   The waves still pour in and the parking lot shows full.   Surfers run down to the beach with their boards and the wind is a light five knots on shore.   BG tosses his cigarette butt and says, “Let’s go.  Wracks get in the coffin.”  Wracks dons the black bell helmet and descends into the hatch.  Cool drinks a beer and tosses the can as close to a trash receptacle as he can.  The green Chevrolet launches southward at light speed. “I told you so, I told you so,” chides BG….  Ten to twelve feet slides and churning green tubes.  What more can you ask for.”

“I have to go work for my father,” says Cool “Mellow.”    Wracks as customary fades into oblivion as the car enters the 101 at California street.    The three arrive back at Bacon Way at three thirty p.m.  “Service with a smile,” says BG.  “Wracks, get out, I have to go to work.”  Wracks grabs his gear in a brown grocery bag and plucks his red NatPro gun from the car.   “Thank you very much, BG that was a session I will always remember.  BG and Cool accelerate in a close circle and rocket up Mellowman’s land to Charmed Street where Cool lives.  Wracks stowed his board in the rafters and washed his super suit with cold hose water.   The little dog sits on the kitchen step, growls, and wags his tail.   Wracks enters the house.  “What’s for dinner” asks Wracks. “Grab a frozen bag of chicken and microwave it, “says Mom.   “Where were you?” “I was surfing big waves up in SB with BG,” explains Wracks.  “go shower off and do your homework,” says Mom.   Wracks walks to his bedroom, then falls into his bed and is asleep.  The day closes, and night arrives again and the darkness brooding in the silence becomes a reality.  Wracks wakes up when it is dark, makes his meal, boils water for a cup of coffee, and reads by his little desk lamp.  The dog saunters in through the doggy door and falls asleep on his little cushion and wracks turns on the evening lights and locks up the house.  A light shine from under the door in Grandma’s room and Grandma is watching Tony Orlando on television.  “Do you need dinner,” asks Wracks.  “No, she says and smiles and holds a speaker up to her ear.  “I already ate.”  The day ends, the night begins and another page turns over in the book of Wrack’s life.  Today he rode long thin tubular waves for a quarter-mile ride while the world turns.  No one noticed except Wracks and maybe his little dog and tomorrow he will wake up and read the Sunday paper and maybe go to church.  Then a new week begins again and wracks grow a little older.

A light and peculiar tapping, not a curious or raucous rapping, happens at my windowpane in the dark, in the night, almost in the morning, and the day is 4 AM. “Wake up wracks, the Bu will be happening soon.”

Whispers BG.  “Don’t you ever sleep,” intones wraks.  “The Bu will be happening,” whispers BG. “Get up.”  “How did you get in my yard without the Dog barking,” asks Wracks.  “Pun kin is with me,” says BG.  “Say hi to wraks punk in.”  A little dog growls somewhere in the dark.  “For the right to surf the Bu when it is happening, I require a pack of smokes and two cans of Coca-Cola.”   “Bring some bread too.” Whispers BG.

Wraks gets up as if summoned by God and grabs his druid robe and wetsuit that hang behind the door.  He opens his door and creeps into the kitchen.   Grabbing a brown paper grocery bag, wraks shovels food into the bag, grabs some coke cans from the refrigerator, and steals a pack of Pall Mall Gold from the stogey stash in the cupboard up above the vacuum cleaner storage bin. Outside, BG sits on the step behind the kitchen door and pets Punk.  “Good morning,” says BG.  “I have a seven-foot-three board I want you to ride today.  The fin is crooked but it was shaped by Rdick and it is a square-tailed gun glassed violet.  Let’s go. Do you have the smokes?”  “I have everything,” promises Wracks.  “Get in the car and let’s go. I want to be out at the third point at morning light.” 

The remains of the night shelter the dark green car from the overhead lights on the street of Bacon Way.  Close to the beach, the wet ocean smell of seaweed and brine reaches the street a mile away from the Pacific Coast Highway.  Cool slumber darkness prohibits the morning from starting and the hatchback car moves at light speed down the way, onto Sunset, then to the highway stretching north for one hundred miles.  “I didn’t hear breaking waves at my house,” says Wracks.  “The swell will hit just as we paddle out,” says BG. “How do you know,” asks Wracks.  “I have my sources,” says GB.  “Who are your sources,” questions wraks.  “A friend, far away,” speaks BG “See that white powder spilled on the carpet,” says BG. “yes,” says wraks.  “Touch it and put your finger in your mouth.”  “What is it?” says Wracks.  “It is performance powder.” Says BG.  “What will it do?” says Wracks.  “It will make you surf better.” Smiles BG.  Wraks complies, wets his finger, touches the spilled powder, and puts his finger in his mouth.  “It does not have any taste.” Says wraks.   “We are almost there.” Says BG “Get ready.”

The city of Malibu permits free parking at Surf Rider Beach if a person arrives before six a.m.   Four vans sit in the slot next to the wall that has graffiti written on the surface.  One sentence written in black spray paint reads, “Mickey Dora is the Cat.” Another says, “Kooks will die.”  A final epithet written in dripping blue paint reads, “Malibu Masochist.”  The wave riders huddle next to their cars, all of them in wetsuits, their boards freshly waxed with paraffin, some smoking, some eating bread, some sipping soup from plastic top ramen cups. One person sits in a van with huge headphones on his ears, drinking Jack Daniels bourbon whiskey from the bottle like seven up. “Who is that.” Asks Wraks.  “That’s Moon doggy. Do not mind him, he takes pictures.” Says BG.  “Are you ready,” asks BG, “Ready as I ever will be,” says Wracks.  “Let us jog up to third.” Says BG.  The race is on.

Pebbles, rocks, starfish, shells, crabs, and seaweed provide an obstacle course in the dark, for two people running without shoes, boards tucked underneath their arms up to the top of the third point.  Two other figures crouch on the beach, waiting.  “Do you have a light,” asks BG.  “I do,” says the phantom in the dark.  BG lights up a cigarette and hands it to wraks then lights another for himself.  The four wait in the dark for ten minutes then the light starts to permeate the space and the beach and the sound of waves becomes more prominent and slowly breaking waves come into view.  “Let us launch,” says BG.  Wraks and BG hole their boards with both hands and run into the tide pool brimming with white water.  Stroking hard, the paddle out is quick in a lull and the two sit outside in twilight in the morning at the Bu. The two others on the beach now race for the water and a six-foot swell appears on the horizon.  BG as always takes the first one and wraks scratches for safety outward into the ocean.  A similar wave rears up and begins to break.  Wraks wheels around and pulls hard into a late takeoff and the race is on. 

 Back on the beach, BG says to Wracks, “See, I told you it would be good.  It should get bigger all through the morning.  The light of the sun comes on and the beach shows as a low tide estuary situation with waves breaking down the line, roundly with a hint of offshore wind to hold up the faces and make spray stream off the top. “Get as many waves as you can before the zoo arrives.” Insists BG.  “When I wave to you, it is time to go. “   Waves fill in at Surf Rider Beach at low tide breaking in shallow water across Third Point Reef.  Four feet, then six feet, then eight to ten-foot sets coming in three at a time and the Rdick square tail gun works well.  Eventually, the sun looms brightly over the mountain to the east and the day begins and the waves come in and break and surfers ride them all.  BG waves his hands on the beach and wraks starts to paddle in.   The parking lot fills up full but it is too early for girls in bikinis to show off their young curvaceous bodies.  Wraks and BG dress covered by their druid robes stack the boards and then enter the cab.  They both pull out of the parking lot before noon as the horde of weekend surfers and beautiful girls descend on the Bu to become the one.  “If the tide is high in the morning, like it usually is during the summer, come back at two PM when the tide starts dropping and the waves will increase as the morning crew rests on the beach,” says BG “I have to go to work.”

The green hatchback accelerates quietly down the Pacific Coast Highway toward Tranquil Hills.  Up on the mountain over the ocean with Deadmans and Bacon as cross streets sits the house of wraks. Wraks unloads the gear from the hatchback and throws the equipment on the ivy under the big pine tree. Pun kin barks behind the gate. “Wow! See you soon.” BG waves then reverses the hatchback and is gone.

Wraks washes off his wetsuit and gear with cold water as sea water corrodes everything rapidly.  The dog makes noises and wags his tail.  Wraks is home and enters the house but no one is home except Grandma who watches Lawrence Welk with a speaker glued to her ear. “Hi grandma,” says Wracks. Grandma smiles and waves.  Wraks closes her door, the dog goes to his cushion and falls asleep and Wracks sits alone with his thoughts and a twenty-pound world history book written by Arnold Toynbee.   The day goes on and then the light fades and another day happens like pages in the book of life.  All of this before the darkness in the days when ripping big waves was all that mattered.