Rip Curl Pro The Outsider - Epilogue

In: Rip Curl Pro by Steve Shearer 4 Comments Sun 11th Apr '10

Tags: steve shearer , kelly slater , old baldy , The Outsider

Steve Shearer
April 12, 2009

Coming back to the Northern Rivers was liking awakening to a world of light. Approaching Melbourne airport through an endless landscape of grey, Soviet-style industry consolidated my emotional photograph of Victoria. When a security lady asked me in a thick Russian accent if I, "hed eny eggzplosuve meterial on me?" I had to reply, "Only the thoughts in my mind concerning professional surfing in Victoria."

Luckily she didn't speak English so well or I might have been confined to a grimy gulag somewhere in Melbourne's outer suburbs.

My comrades in arms, the brethren bus drivers and cabbies of Ballina airport, recognised me better than my eight month old son - two weeks can seem like an eternity sometime. To be amongst equals and honest men, after the relentlessly hierarchical world of Pro Surfing, where the instinct for rank and status is the only common denominator, was joyous. Big Pete, Benny, Bruce - diamonds of men every last one of 'em - all wanted to know the score and how the future of o-ten was shaping up.

"Listen up gents," I began, "a tenth title for Old Baldy is beginning to take on an Homeric Hue". Poets to a man these bus drivers, they understand this kind of language. "This is a man who is moving leisurely in the amplitude of forgotten time"
Bruce farted loudly and yelled "Eh, bus to Byron!" to a group of pole-axed looking backpackers.
"Go on, go on", he said, turning back to me.
"If we analyse the omens: the broken foot, the opening heat at Snapper Rocks, the fact that his titles have come on a 'year on, year off' basis, the overwhelming force of inertia of a Slater title run etcetera. If we consider all this and the dominance at the Pipeline then....." Pete had put his hand up and moved in conspiratorially.
"Mate, I have to tell you now.....you've been....um....sacked"
"Oh", I said.
"Yeah. Easter and all.....you just weren't here."
"No, no I wasn't."

My daughter was tugging on my shirt, "Come on Dad, lets go home"
A momentary cloud of despair passed by like an eclipse, and now a sudden and almost overwhelming illuminating surge of joy flooded my soul.

Slater and a tenth title....hahahhahahhahaa.

A quote from famous American NFL coach Vince Lombardi seems to sum up the philosophical framework of Pro Surfing: 'You have to be smart enough to understand how the game works, and dumb enough to think it is important'.

Time for The Outsider to go surfing. Thanks for reading.

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