by Bart Key
Just recently, I developed a yen to return to Australia. And for old times’ sake, I would invite Cory to come along with me.
•
Back when I was a young surf bum, in my wildest dreams I never would have envisioned how my life was to develop. It all started of course when I entered Sur’s world. There wasn’t any kind of eureka moment when we met nor was I suddenly hypnotized by his charisma. It was more like he was a person I just wanted to be around and become buddies with even though he was a bit older than me. And what better way to begin than by teaching the guy to surf. Almost from the moment we first paddled out together, he took to surfing like it was finding God or something. Then suddenly here I was helping him fix up his house and had soon moved in with him. Then he set me up in my own digs which I soon shared with two other guys, who together with Sur, became my best buddies for life.
I was surprised and frankly somewhat scared when Sur asked me to take charge of remodeling his Wild Beach retreat. He just trusted me to do it and never looked back. I was doubly shaken when he made me his Ventura office manager as I had no experience having never done anything even remotely like that before. In spite of my apprehension however, I soon entered the fray and became comfortable in the position. Sur just seemed to know what my talents were and what I was capable of doing. Through the years, never once did Sur look down on me or any of us for that matter. In my case, he seemed to know that I was not much the leader-type but could nonetheless command great respect from those around me. Sur had always been impressed with the high regard in which I was held within my small community of fellow surfers. Sur cherished my laid-back demeanor and how I would rather turn the other cheek than resort to any kind of altercation unless something really pissed me off like when someone mistreated a kid. Sur considered me to be smart but I wasn’t even in the same ballpark as he was. Unless you were really close to him you wouldn’t know what a genius he was. He went out of his way not to be seen as anyone special. He was always upbeat and ready to rock. The only times I ever saw him sad were when his grandparents passed away and when the boys’ mom died. And, of course, on our way back from the African incident.
When I turned forty, I finally woke up and had to accept the fact that my physicality was waning and by fifty, the decline was all too evident. I wasn’t the best surfer out there anymore. The younger dudes, however, still came around to pump me with questions on surf conditions and wave tendencies. They knew that I’d been out there more times than they could count.
My sex life also wasn’t as vibrant as it had been when I was younger. But I thank my lucky stars it’s still far from dormant and every so often I still run into an occasional opportunity for some friendly frolicking. Karen usually comes to visit me in Guanacaste once or twice a year. Though older too, she is still gorgeous and loves to surf and do other things with me. I will always be in her debt for her patience and resolve in teaching me all about computers and programming. Now, with more than a dozen courses under my belt, I have become the whiz kid at online research which is my special talent as a member of the shadow squad.
My parents are both gone now and I live a pretty quiet life in my bungalow home in Guanacaste. Since joining the shadow squad I feel rejuvenated and am anxious to get going when Ward calls with an assignment. Being with Cory takes me back to the good old days and now we have a new buddy in Gustav. It has not been lost on Cory and me that we’re getting closer to the ages when we might want to think about retiring from the squad and let younger folks take our places. But not yet.
My main activity now is to be the perfect “uncle” to Paco and Miguel’s kids. And can you believe it, all five love surfing and can’t wait for me to show them how to improve their skills so that someday they can become experts “like you Uncle Jeremy”. How can it get it get any better than that?
•
I’m amused when Jeremy and Cory bitch and moan about getting older. After all, I’m even older and these days I hardly even think about aging. Betty and I are a blissfully married couple and, while no longer spring chickens, we can hardly keep our hands off each other. Together we work tirelessly to make CHOW the success Sur envisioned. I sold my condo in Geneva some time ago and live with Betty in her beautiful home with a view of the Lake. I still have my powerboat which I keep moored at a marina in Guanacaste. When Betty and I travel to San Jose on CHOW business, we always try to take a few days off afterwards and take the boat out for a for a day or two. We always stop to say hello to everyone including Sur unless he’s off on his yacht somewhere. When he is at home and the surf’s up, either on his beach or somewhere close by, a group of us will get together and go for it. Betty, Sofia and Anita will always come along to watch us be crazy. Betty still can’t believe she married a surfer.
Recently on my way back from a visit to the San Francisco office, I took some time off and visited Cory for a couple of days at the Bar 7. After saddling up, we rode to a fishing spot we knew about inside the bison compound. As we rode, the subject of Vietnam came up as it invariably does when the two of us get to talking. For some reason I mentioned to Cory all about Sur’s uneasy state of mind during the week before he left Vietnam to fly home. At the time I figured his troubled thoughts might have something to do with his earlier experience of having lost several of his men during combat. But somehow it came up in conversation that he felt guilty because he had not done more to make the fighting stop even sooner than it had. I didn’t understand what he meant by that and still don’t. When I visited him in Ventura after leaving the service, he told me that right after arriving back to his home in Idaho and visiting his grandparents, he left and just drove around aimlessly in the northwest for a couple of weeks trying to come to grips with his angst. And there were at least a couple of more instances after that when he clearly was experiencing great anguish again, the latest being on our flight back home after the African rescue operation. But then, almost coincident with the establishment of his foundation, he seemed to be more at peace with himself than I had ever seen before. It was as though the burdens he had been carrying with him all these years had been lifted once and for all. His behavior changed as well. He began encouraging those close to him to move on with their lives without his being much in the picture anymore.
Over dinner that evening Cory and I smoked a little dope and reminisced about the shadow squad’s experiences so far. Cory related that he and Jeremy now looked forward to assignments and loved working with Gustav. Having now observed Gustav’s street smarts at work, it was clear that Gustav was not someone you would ever want to mess with. I told Cory that I expected the squad’s missions would probably increase over time. I was also candid with him about needing to start thinking about recruiting new squad members from the younger generation. Cory gave me one of his rare grins and said he got the message. He suggested that I consider both Josh and Juan as potential future candidates. They were both smart, tough and perhaps a little crazy like the four of us. Later, when I had a similar conversation with Jeremy, he suggested that Kali and Maria should be considered as future members. He had witnessed up close their resolve and fearlessness under harsh surf conditions. He also chuckled that it wouldn’t surprise him if the two didn’t become a couple someday judging by the way they acted when they were together now.
•
My elderly parents still live in Porterville in the same house where I grew up. I try to visit them two or three times a year. While I will always have wonderful memories of California and the High Sierras, I can’t imagine now ever living anywhere except the Bar 7. My closest buddy now is my horse Joey and hardly a day goes by when I’m not out riding him. Over time, I have become very attached to Mat, Bret and Josh. When each was old enough, I invited him to join me on a summer pack trip into the wilderness area of the national forest adjoining the ranch. Luke was always invited to come along but always bowed out as he knew this would be an event his son would enjoy more if dad didn’t tag along. I�
�ve also become very close to Roberto’s kids especially Juan. Occasionally he and I ride together off the beaten track inside the bison enclosure which has begun to teem with wildlife. The two of us are much alike in that we’re both at home in the wilder settings of the ranch and adjoining national forest.
Sur rarely visits the ranch now and I miss him. I will always remember the first time our paths crossed when my patrol accompanied him and Ward on missions through the thick Laotian jungle. That was the first time I witnessed some of Sur’s amazing talents. I thought I was talented at knowing where we were at any given time but he was better, much better. And I swear he could smell when the enemy was close. Whenever that happened, all of us would tense up and were naturally scared except Sur. He was always eerily calm, relaxed and seemingly unconcerned. Each time he and Ward stopped somewhere on a trail to observe the results of some top secret experiments, Sur would make an instant appraisal and whisper it to Ward who would make a note of it. I never could see anything that looked very much out of the ordinary and asked Ward once what the hell was Sur looking at. Ward apologized that he wasn’t allowed to tell me but assured me that Sur knew precisely what he was doing. It was all a bit spooky. After I had joined Sur’s remodeling crew, Ward confided in me that when Sur had joined brigade staff, Ward’s new assignment was to become Sur’s constant companion and protect him from harm no matter what. The army apparently considered Sur to be a critical participant in some secret planning operations. Sur even had to obtain special permission from the brigade commander before being allowed to conduct his evaluations in the boonies. Ward witnessed Sur work his magic in convincing the general to give his permission. Jeremy, Ward and I were all well acquainted with Sur’s amazing talents of persuasion.
Although Sur always tried hard to be just one of the guys, the three of us knew he really wasn’t. His intelligence level clearly was up in the ozone and he would always be calm and collected during the most perilous of situations. Even after becoming an expert surfer, he still wiped out much more often than the rest of us because he didn’t think twice about challenging the most formidable of waves, ones which the rest of us would not think twice about letting go by. After getting beat up during a bad wipeout, he would resurface, signal he was okay and paddle right back out. Sometimes he would return to the beach covered with bruises, welts and scratches but never anything very serious. He always seemed to heal fairly quickly too. In fact, I couldn’t recall his ever being seriously injured or sick. The other three of us were pretty lucky on that score as well.
During the years I traveled with Sur as his assistant, I learned that the main reason he wanted me along was because he trusted me and enjoyed being with me. He could have cared less about the bodyguard part but put up with it because Ward, Jeremy and I felt differently. Whenever Sur was scheduled to travel to someplace considered risky, Ward would implore me to carry a weapon in case trouble should arise. To this day I don’t know how Jeremy managed it, but after landing, there would always be someone waiting for me on the other side of customs who would surreptitiously slip me a loaded handgun. Back in the day when we visited countries like Nicaragua and Colombia, I remember feeling much more at ease knowing I was carrying. It would never have occurred to Sur that he should be armed. He was oblivious to danger. Not once did I ever see him uneasy in what to me were obvious risky situations.
Consistent with that, Sur was never the least uncomfortable when everyone around him spoke in a different language. As far as I know Sur spoke only English except for a little French which he learned in college. I would watch him at business meetings when sometimes others present would carry on a discussion among themselves in another language while Sur just sat there quietly and waited. I always had a sneaking suspicion that somehow he understood everything that was being said.
Sur recently called to tell me he was coming to the Bar 7 for a couple of days and then would like me to accompany him on a trip to Australia. After the normal stops for refueling and rest, we finally landed at the New South Wales station where we relaxed for a couple of days, riding horseback in the countryside and adjusting to the time change. Sur had brought along some good weed which opened up the laughter as we discussed old times. He also talked about Vietnam when he was a platoon leader and the men he had lost during combat. He talked about Ward and how the two of them were all but inseparable during the last several months of his tour. I was mesmerized by his recollections. It was almost like he wanted to remember them one more time.
From the station, we flew to the Wollongong where we rented a Range Rover and drove to our hotel. The next morning, with our surfboards in tow, we headed to one of the spots the four of us had visited years earlier. I remembered it well because the surf had been too rough and domineering for my limited skills. I had been more than content to stay on the shore and watch my three buddies struggle to get through the shore break and then attempt to ride in the vicious surf. This time the conditions looked to be just as menacing. When we arrived, there were a couple of diehard surfers out beyond the break. So Sur began the arduous task of paddling out to join them. When he got there he would push himself fearlessly into one of the incoming monster waves. The first two times, he wiped out badly and came to the surface sputtering. But back he went back for a third try. I watched as he entered into what surely had to be the nastiest wave I had seen that day so far. I don’t know why, but somehow I knew he would not survive it. I watched as he wiped out again but this time I didn’t see him return to the surface. The other two surfers and I immediately began to search for him to no avail. Soon, a search party was organized to assist in the search but it was called off when darkness set in. His body was never recovered although pieces of his board were found on the beach the next morning.
I called Jeremy and Ward the night it happened to pass on the horrible news. Two days later, they and Betty arrived at my hotel and we drove to the spot where he had disappeared. It was an amazingly beautiful day and the surf was much calmer. Betty cried on Ward’s shoulder and Jeremy sobbed uncontrollably. Ward and I just looked at each other and shook our heads in sadness and disbelief. The Sur we knew seemingly could survive anything. But not this time. Later at our hotel, the four of us took some solace in knowing that this was the way he would have wanted to go.
The day after the incident, I called Li, David, Paco, Miguel and Luke to pass on the news of Sur’s tragic end. Uncharacteristically for Li, he broke down with grief as did Miguel and David. Paco and Luke were their usual staid selves but I could tell they were devastated. During his sobbing, David told me he was not totally surprised. He had a gut feeling that Sur’s turning over his vast wealth to his foundation was setting the stage for his eventual exit. Sur had made it known that upon his demise there should be no funeral. So there wasn’t. Instead, about a month later we all celebrated his life with a wake on his private beach at Casa Sur.
•
When Betty and I flew back from Guanacaste, we were both somber and still grief stricken. But we were also optimistic about the future. Our common path forward was more clear now than ever. We would do everything in our powers to make CHOW so successful that over time it could be said that its programs had positive results in improving the human condition. While Sur had never found the formula he sought to end wars, he had found a way to take some steps in the right direction.
•
After Cory called me in Hong Kong with the tragic news, I called Chen to pass it on. He was strangely quiet. He told me later that after I had called, he had personally visited his aging father to tell him of the tragedy. His father hadn’t known about Sur until some years after the opening of the Jade Palace. His only comment to Chen when hearing the sad news was that “sometimes the best among us are hidden”.
•
Months later, the three amigos as Sur liked to call us, met in Ventura for a surfing holiday. We had a great time and at Ward’s suggestion we decided to run the beach which we hadn
’t done in years. After tuning up a little with some good weed, we commenced our run. While we were much slower now in our pace, we still enjoyed watching all the people on the beach. Along the way, Jeremy smiled and pointed to what looked to be an older brother teaching his younger brother how to surf.