The Shape of the Winter Wind
Robb Todd
Winter 2010
Winter 2010
Only one man surfed here. It was a mountain wave of ice and shark teeth. We rode our bikes across the highway we weren't supposed to ride our bikes across. We sat on the cold cliffside. We thought the wave was going to kill him. That is why we watched. He dropped down the wall of water, cut a line across its face like a razor before the wave swallowed him in a thunder of exploding whitewash.
Our bikes were heavy steel. A bunny hop was a serious trick. We wore corduroys and Toughskins and checkered Vans and Zips and we jumped dirt ramps over a row of our friends like fourth-grade Evel Knievels. Elvis and Belushi died. Fog rolled over the highway that separated our elementary school from the ocean. We played kickball at recess. Baby bounces. Red rubber ball in the road was a home run. An Indian cried when we threw trash out the car window. We were afraid of Russians but not strangers. The Miracle on Ice and Richard Pryor on fire. Pinball and KISS and “1984” in 1982.
No fathers anywhere, just single mothers with two jobs, too much cocaine and holes in their diaphragms. We played soccer not football. We cut calla lilies like steak-knife samurai and lied about it. We made waves in empty jars with turpentine, water and food coloring. We graduated from Pong to Atari. We almost burned the house down with matches. Twice.
We wore Underoos and jumped across the living room window like Superman, a towel for a cape. We landed on the couch cushions and jumped again and again. The neighbor stared at us from behind a curtain. We rode a Big Wheel and a Green Machine in the street. The neighbor invited us in, gave us candy. He had magazines with lots of young boys who looked like us, and a machine we'd never seen before that played videotapes. He had a video camera.
We watched the surfer beat the wave again and again. The trees along the jagged cliff took the shape of the winter wind even when the air was still. Whipped streaks of green set against stone. The bare branches of dead trees were X-rays of thick bones, twisted and shattered.