Sunday, May 6, 2012

Whatever happened to, "Thou shalt not steal."?

That was the central question going through my head as I was gut shank-snaked on a little left peak by a North County shaper with a Jesus dove on his board. Now, I'm all about forgiving and forgetting but heck, I didn't even get a playful over the shoulder, I'm-gonna-rip-you-off-just-cause-it's-small-out-here nod. I'm used to getting cut out like that, that's an easier burn to swallow. No way, this was a stone cold assassin move. It had been practiced. Maybe perfected. At Cardiff. 

Or maybe he just thought I was going right.

11 comments:

Better Yeti said...

I think it's because Jesus wanted him to have that wave. It's in the bible, I'm sure.

I'm going to go way out on a limb here and say that this phenomenon you've pointed out is -- for me -- the single most debilitating thing about OC beach life: the aggressively delusional weltanschauung of the Born Again/evangelical crowd. All the rhetoric about WWJD and the righteous life and charity and piety blah blah blah, all while living in the most privileged/narcissistic/silicone-implanted/Humvee-driving/petroleum-economy-dense pocket on the entire planet. I mean, the cognitive dissonance is just paralyzing. Especially in the line-up: "My wave! I'm going to beat your a**!" and he glides by and you catch a glance at the little Jesus-fish... It's not even irony; it's pure dissociation, compartmentalizing one part of life from another.

And the freakish mind-tricks they play to get around it: Those god-wants-you-to-be-rich tracts -- masterpieces of magical thinking -- about how you give it up to The Lord and he pays you back tenfold, with compounded interest in a tax-sheltered Roth IRA account.

Okay, I've said too much. Suffice to say I'm marginally more comfortable with the amoral, soul-dead film producers at Little Dume who've at least fully embraced their self-interest and social predation, and are fine with it. At least you know where they stand, and you don't feel like you're standing in a moral hall of mirrors.

Anonymous said...

SUP brother or lay down surfer?

John Ashley said...

Frickin' Yeti...

Would love to see you around a campfire down in Baja, twenty Pacificos into it and considering the tequila. You'd be the guy to finally explain to me how compound interest works and why the bean come out in a perfect cylinder shape when you open both ends of the can. Or at least levitate or something.

Thank you for that.

John Ashley said...

Sup brother, Anonymous. Sup brother.

Better Yeti said...

John,

I'll be your Carlos Castaneda if you'll be my Indiana Jones.

John Ashley said...

Will Sean Connery be there? Fuck it. I'm in.

Anonymous said...

Better Yeti-
Nice sweeping generalization of the Born Again/Evangelical crowd, but alas, it is quite well deserved, and i am one of them.
I wont get into all the good my fellow jesus fish cadre perform-it wont matter to you-youve made up your mind-which in the end is saddest part.
Personally i dont mind hanging out with the amoral crowd you feel so comfortable with-i was one, and in some cases slip right back into being comfortable being one again-its just human nature-the nature of man is selfishness, greed, lust etc..
Luckily the nature of God is to forgive.
If we ever surf together i promise to abide by the 11th commandment-"Thou shalt no snake thy brother"
Jon

John Ashley said...

The 11th commandment- that's the one I'm thinking about. But there's a caveat- if you're friends, it's okay to snake them provided you look back at them while you're taking off and let loose with some type of cackle. The cackle makes it all better (at least once). See you at Patch Jon!

Anonymous said...

Well said John!-i hereby decree you can pull the snake/lookback/cackle manuever with me anytime-just as long as im not on Spicollisan!!, and bring Yeti too-i would hang out with that guy anytime,
Hope to see you out soon-keep up the great posts.
Jon

Better Yeti said...

Anon,

See, I'm not naive enough to walk, flat-footed, into a discussion of (a)theism or morality; you're entitled to whatever framework you choose in order to square the mystery of existence (and so long as it doesn't impose on others' societal freedoms). But I am inclined to observe your assertion of, "hey, if only you knew what charitable works some of us do in our spare time."

See, I think charity is great. Good works, fab. But in my view of the Life Well Lived, we're defined by who we are at our worst, not our best (or, for the purposes of this discussion, "Get off my fkn wave Barney I'll beat your valley a**" vs. "Jesus died for you sins&I will turn the other cheek and bail in the shack so that you may have thy shoulder-hop.") Lots of sociopaths fill up the coffers on Sunday. But how bad are they at their worst? -- "Where's the floor?" is a question I ask about people a lot.

Not to flog a dead horse, but I'm in a finance&law-related field, and I've seen a whole lot of people who do "good works" one day and set fire to orphanages (metaphorically speaking... everybody calm down) the next. It's a phenomenon I've heard&seen way too often, from people whose floors -- to recall the metaphor -- are quite low. It's almost like it's a psychological law, or something.

Besides, didn't the biblical Jesus say something about doing good works by stealth? That doesn't seem to be the OC way, either.

Just sayin'. The day that OC GDP starts mysteriously evaporating from yachts, real estate speculation, exotic cars and plastic surgery and begins to silently and mysteriously reappear in the budgets of homeless shelters and soup kitchens is the day I start to believe in you with a capital B.

Doesn't seem likelym, but I ain't going to rule it out, either.

Anonymous said...

Yeti-Poor John!-all he did was post an observation and now its devolved into an Post Modern Christianity/Ethics 101!
Great points again Yeti-i can find no fault in your astute, deserved, and well written observations of the OC Yhwehlitterati (pretty sure i just made up a new word there!)
I like your "Floor" theory-but its nothing new, and its not just a psychological law-its a spiritual one-and spiritual laws are unbreakable and binding even to those that deny them-its a harsh reality really-and i suppose a rather self righteous sounding one at that. I get it-people dont like absolutes-especially ones that may eternally infringe on their societal freedoms. The good news is that according to Jesus-the "saved" get that way by Grace and not works-WHEW!-good thing because, well, to refer to what you do and what you see, thats obviously the only way to attone for their/our behavior.
Yes he did say-"let not your left hand know what your right hand is doing"-Stealth-its a rarity unfortunately-and its not only not the OC way-its no mans way-its just ingrained into the human nature-again the whole "Grace" thing applies.
Lastly i sincerely hope you do not way for the big day you mentioned to believe, and i see you wisely did not completely rule it out-(self conscious or divinely inspired Self Preservation?!) you and i both know that day never comes, the good thing is the day has already passed that allows all men to turn away from evil, and yacht buying and even lowly wave snaking-all one has to do Yeti-is simply believe.
"Behold i stand at the door and knock-if anyone hears and listens and heeds my voice and opens the door, i will come in to him and dine with him, and he with me"
Jon