Full circles

When I moved to Hawaii 8 years ago, I began my painting and my surfing journey - two “interests” that have changed the course of my life. My first board was a T&C 7’ 4” funboard which taught me to paddle and catch waves. My first artworks were watercolor and pen ink doodles in small sketchbooks which taught me to see. Each year, with practice, my surfing and painting flowed with greater confidence and experience. My boards got smaller, my paintings got “better.” I’m now riding my first custom T&C 5’ 5 1/2” short board. I’m now teaching half-day painting workshops. Full circles. I’ve come so far and have much further to go.

The colors of my board are the soft pastel colors of the Ewa sky in the morning, right when the sun is coming up from behind Waikiki. On the bottom of the board, I wanted the checkers to gradually disappear like floating particles, signifying a spiritual release. The idea came from Philip Pullman’s Amber Spyglass, one of my favorite books… when our spirit is released, our particles permeate everything and we reunite with the atoms of all living things. We are whole, together, lokahi. When I surf is when I feel this wholeness the most – sea, sky, earth, me, you. This board is the physical embodiment of appreciation for life’s beauty, and my hope that we can be reunited in peace, harmony and wholeness, with the natural world and with each other.