Four months ago we organized a small paddle out.  The first one I’ve been involved in.

A ‘Paddle Out’ is a memorial to honor friends and loved ones that have died.  A way for surfers to pay tribute to people they have lost.  Everyone paddles out beyond the breakwater where the seas are calm.  They sit on their boards in a circle, join hands and talk about and pray for the dear one they have lost.  There can be chanting, flowers given, singing, splashing….there are no hard and fast rules…it can be simple, as ours was, or quite elaborate.  It is a celebration of life and in true surfer form, done about as close to nature as one can get.

This Wahine Wednesday 4 months ago was dedicated to the 19 Hotshot firefighters that were killed in the Prescott, Arizona – Yarnell Hill fire in June.  Specifically, our local, hometown hero, Kevin Woyjeck, 21, whom most of us knew or knew his family.  After our simple ceremony, we collectively caught 19 waves to honor the 19 souls lost in that fateful fire.

Kevin was 21, not much older than my son.  A fact that hit me hard as if taking a swift blow to the gut.  Kevin was a young man with his life ahead of him.  He had followed in his father’s footsteps and became a firefighter.  He was a young man who still had many firsts to experience who lost his life, much to soon, doing what he loved.

Losing a child.  This pain is unimaginable to me.  I cannot wrap my mind around it.  How a parent who has lost a child manages to gather the strength to function in this world is astounding to me.  I am in awe of them.  The fact that people that I know, sweet friends in my small surf town, are trying to find a way to deal with this incredible loss…is heartbreaking to me.

This leaves me feeling helpless.

And grateful.

And a little guilty.

I look around at the people in my life. Many of my family and friends are struggling.  They are dealing with crises.  Problems that make you not want to get out of bed in the morning.  Issues that feel so insurmountable you become paralyzed with fear and sadness and anger.  They are facing stormy seas.

Here is where my guilt comes in.  My life is pretty smooth right now.  I have had tragedies in the past.  I know there are more to come, that’s just how life works.  But right now, my seas are calm.

I can sleep at night. I can hop out of bed in the morning.  I can smile and laugh.

My storm is on the horizon somewhere in the distance.

I have been trying to settle the guilt.  To lessen the questions.  To help myself not feel bad for not feeling bad.

The only way I can rationalize this is to continue to be grateful everyday.

And to love.

Everyone expresses love differently.  It might be though making a meal.  It might be by giving money.  Maybe it’s a strong hug, a deep gaze and an “I am here.”  It might be a phone call or a text or a delivered card.  Sometimes it is just in listening.

There are no right or wrong answers in love and whatever it is, it is enough.

Feeling ever so helpless that Wahine Wednesday back in June, we decided to honor Kevin and the 18 others in our Wahine Wednesday surf.  This may seem frivolous to some, or without meaning to others but it was the only thing that made sense. A natural act of love to honor those lost.

It felt wrong to just go about our Wahine Wednesday merely on a quest to find waves and stoke.  We needed this WW to have meaning.  We needed to know that this surf session was about something so much more important than ourselves.

And it was.

It was about sweet Kevin and his grieving family.  It was about the other men who died and their hurting loved ones.  It was about all of us laying our own troubles on the shore and paddling out in honor of these brave young men.

I think everyone was impacted by the paddle out that day.  A reminder that life is so incredibly short.  That sometimes horrible things happen to good people for no apparent reason.  A recognition that we can’t take someone’s pain away but we can lovingly stand beside them.

What I have witnessed in watching Kevin’s family from afar deal with this tragedy is that it is the people around you that get you through.  It is the raw, unbridled love expressed by others that help to see you see through the pain.

What gives people hope is the connections we have with others.

The leaning on.

The crying with.

The holding.

The sharing with.

The understanding.

At the end of the day, it is about the people in our lives.

The love we share.

The bonds we have.

The connections we make.

It isn’t about the house, the car, the clothes, the almighty dollar or the STUFF.

It is about LOVE!!

Always has been and always will be.

I believe, by surfing in Kevin’s, and his 18 fallen comrades honor that day, we showed them love…and it was enough.