Rose Bowl? What Rose Bowl?

Text & photos by: Shannon Kelley
Gould

New Year’s Day: For some, it’s a time to
reassess, to reevaluate, to take stock of their lives and determine
what they want to change. For others, it’s a day to recuperate from
the excesses of the holidays, to nurse their hangovers while
swearing off baked brie, fudge, and eggnog for another year — or at
least until they can get their skinny jeans back on. And for some,
incomprehensibly, it’s all about the football. (I’ve said it once
and I’ll say it again: Spandex is never appropriate. Period.) For
me, well, I had to work. Fortunately, though, this is the surf
issue, and when January 1 arrived, marked by sunny skies, warm
temps, and decent waves, hitting the beach for a day of peeping was
a no-brainer — which was convenient, considering the brain cells
I’d offed while ringing in the new year the night before.

And so, propped up by very necessary caffeine, I made my way
down to Rincon to check out the scene, feeling a bit guilty when a
heavily in-demand parking spot miraculously opened up just as I
pulled in. Chalking it up to good parking karma, I quickly got over
it (no guilt in 2007!) and began my tour, coming upon a truckload
of preteen towheads wrapping up their day with dad, a couple of
guys basking in that deliciously exhausted post-surfing high, and
world-renowned surfer Shaun Tomson driving in. Not bad for five
minutes in the parking lot. And though I likely could have done the
job without moving, something compelled me to venture farther, down
to the beach. Yes, the surf and the sand are always tempting, but
this was something different.

If you know Rincon at all, you know The Pit. And you know it was
The Pit and its inhabitants that beckoned me, as no Rincon Peeps
would be complete without the 805’s most famous surf spot’s most
familiar faces, and The Pit is where I would find them. The
makeshift living room has everything a die-hard surfer could want:
seating, shade, a barbecue pit, even a Christmas tree — courtesy of
pit-chick Debbie Stetson and her daughter Summer — and the easiest
of access to the waves. I was swiftly pulled in by
surfer/skater/photographer Woody Woodward and introduced to the
crew, a tight-knit bunch whose friendships go back decades, with
Rincon’s legendary swells in the background. They talked of old
times but seemed perfectly content with the arrival of a new year,
and the new times it would bring. And in chatting with those guys,
so clearly intimate with Mother Nature and her ways, I had a
feeling they knew better than to be making any resolutions. If it
ain’t broke, don’t fix it, as the saying goes, and their
Rincon-side world is most decidedly not broke.

Where will your peeps be? Email shannon@independent.com. For
more peeps, visit independent.com.

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