Chapter 3: Surfing Asbury With The Watered Down Rebel

Apparently I arrived in New Jersey on the best surfing day of the year. Hurricane Hanna has churned up some swell, and all the necessary elements came together to create an incredibly perfect day, or so says Wig and a guy from South America I met in the water the day after. I woke up at Kate's house the morning after my arrival and rode her bike to the beach to see some pretty good sized sets with a light onshore wind. Not perfect anymore but the water was warm and the weather hot.

I borrowed an 80's short board from Wig, a good friend from high school and also the owner and operator of the Bouncing Souls Merch Co. from day one. The board says Triple X across the top in total 80's style. He actually bought it for 50 bucks off a guy who owned a strip club in Asbury Park in the 70's and 80's. He bought it from him right out of the same building that use to be the strip club but is now some sort of creepy crash pad for the guy. Wig was walking by it one day I think. I don't remember all the details of Wig's board buying story but it was a pretty good one. It probably just hung on the wall back in the strip club days but now it gets to ride and it rides pretty sweetly.

The Jersey shore in September is just dripping with character everywhere you look, especially the Asbury Park boardwalk. The light changes a little bit from the harsher brightness of summer to the more mellow amber of autumn so everything looks a little golden. The old guys look more distinguished and the women look more Mediterranean. Geez, I'm making Asbury Park sound like the Riviera. Actually they have something in common somehow.. The French Riviera is rich and sleazy and Asbury Park is crazy and sleazy.... by reputation, but that is changing.. right now its golden.

When I stay at Kate's house in Asbury Park, one of my favorite things to do is ride her beach cruiser bike south down the boardwalk. The journey takes me through an extended landscape of abandoned buildings, questionable neighborhoods, and a lot of new construction that is popping up everywhere. I pass by the Baronet theatre and a place that use to be the Fast Lanes next to what is now the Asbury Lanes. We got tricked into the "pay to play" scenario at the Fast Lanes once many years ago. We were pissed because they make you sell tickets to your friends and they take most of the money… Another lesson on our journey through the harsh reality of the music business. In a two or three mile stretch I ride through the developmental contradictions of Asbury, past the historic, pretty and creepily religious camp of Ocean Grove into the working class Jersey town of Bradley Beach and end in mook central, Belmar. Its really amazing how distinct each town is.

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Have you ever wondered where you would be if you suddenly lost your body? Where do you go? Would we perceive ourselves in a whole other dimension? A dimension where our bodies are vibrating differently so we look more like stars floating around in space. I'm curious. I guess the only way to find out is to die. We will all get there eventually.

There are spiritual practices where the main focus everyday is to practice being totally aware in each moment. When something comes to our awareness we do our best to clarify what it is so we can remain in a state of total clarity. This way when death arrives our mind isn't muddled with everything going on in our worldly dramas. If our mind is spinning in circles about the Yankee game, or the argument we didn't win, or whatever then we have to create a new body so we can see the Yankees and win an argument. Our thoughts generate that much power. If that is all true then it makes me wonder..What the hell was I thinking to create Asbury Park, New Jersey??? And what the hell were the old golden guys and gals on the boardwalk thinking. Our reality isn't far from Blade runner here in Bizzaro world. Lets look at youtube for a minute..

http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=J_hYs1jBy8Y

Blade Runner is so good. I have to watch it again.. Amazing. "Time TO DIE."

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I remember riding through these same streets 20 years ago wondering about the mystery of them. It was really a ghost town back then but man did it inspire me. I was filled with the fuel to do stuff, cut lose with whatever and act stupid and crazy on stage but I wasn't free in regular life. I was afraid of how people would perceive me so much that I barely interacted. It was safer to be alone. I really let loose on stage back then though because I was so uptight in the rest of my life. I was a rebellious soul without a grasp on how the world works or how I worked. I think we all are total rebels in a world where the rebel has been watered down. I remember when having blue hair made a HUGE statement. You were totally one of Satan's followers, man and it was fun. Now it's not that easy. We are living in the world of the watered down rebel. We are rebels with laptops…Yawn. Where's my hatchet and my pitch fork, I wanna kill some of the kings men with a blunt metal instrument I forged in fire with my bare hands!!. Who's with ME!!

"We won't Pay the Kings Taxes..Right My fellow American peasants!!!!!"

Ok…back to my IbookG4.(Slumping my head a little) I wish it was that cut and dry. It's really hard to realize our warrior potential in this world. We can't go on the Buffalo hunt and celebrate our first kill. The best we can do is this…Express our selves beyond the norm. Communicate more meaningfully with each other. No one can take that away from us. The internet really makes this possible on an unimaginable scale so it's a great great thing. And some part of me knows we have done plenty of slaughtering with blunt instruments so its time to live a little more beautifully with each other. We can reach out into distant places we never could and I don't mean the space program. Will we do it though? Will we explore the new boundaries or we will we keep creating technologically advanced blunt instruments to use on each other?

Somewhere in the back of my mind I always felt a voice saying,"What's the use in trying, everything has been done already." I really believed that bullshit too. I didn't just believe it; it was like that voice was just guiding me along in my sleep walk. Just feed the body, go to sleep and get by. You are nobody..everybody is nobody. Life has no meaning. All that shit was programmed into my subconscious and running like a reel to reel tape player. I believe that vibe is out there like radio waves and it takes a lot of determination and help and good old love and nurturing to not fall into a bad frequency. Its up to us to turn the tide and know deeply that being a human is not just something we are supposed to survive but an incredibly amazing and meaningful adventure experience that you don't want to miss. We have to help each other wake up and stay on the same channel..

http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeDjO0lbqyU&feature=related