Sad.
The Margaret River Pro swings wide its rustic shutters in just under four days and surf fans, already lined up outside wearing rain slickers, are licking their lips with lusty glee. What was once merely the fourth stop on tour, you see, is now a macabre bacchanal wherein underperforming Championship Tour surfers are presented before their heads lopped off squirting giddy watchers with their blood.
The architect of this gruesome festival, Chief of Executives Erik Logan, imagined, I think, a tableau in which surf fans would be delighted by the public ending of careers of lightly considered professionals though must have never considered that the world’s greatest surfer, Kelly Slater, would be lined up shoulder to shoulder with Michael Rodrigues and Zeke Lau ready to taste the executioner’s blade.
Yikes.
But how is the 11-time World Champion handling it all?
Not good.
And I know that I’m not allowed to look at his Instagram account but I just can’t help myself. Lately it features photo after photo, video after video of his past triumphs.
Nostalgia.
Though did you know that nostalgia, until recently, was considered a troublesome psychopathological condition? It is true and let us turn to the National Library of Medicine for more.
Nostalgia, a psychopathological condition affecting individuals who are uprooted, whose social contacts are fragmented, who are isolated and who feel totally frustrated and alienated, was first described in the 17th century and was a problem of considerable interest to physicians in the 18th and 19th centuries. By the 20th century it seemed to have disappeared, but reappeared under other labels.
How does your lusty glee feel now?
Your delight?
Sad.