The end of the world begins in the sea we love.

I can't make something 'useful' to me in a writing sense for a very long time. I don't have any journalistic instinct. And I do keep a journal, but it's neither very revealing nor fruitful for work. Stuff just bubbles up from the swamp later.

Every great moment of social change was once a confirmed impossibility. People's determination in the face of overwhelming odds has, time and again, triumphed over what seems impossible. This is what you tell yourself.

What I'm saying so badly is we're bred now to believe we're in control and should be in control.

And the sun on the wall of her room, the block of sun with all the tiny flying things in it. When she was little she thought they were the souls of dead insects, still buzzing in the light.

Surfers travelled and opened up and changed. It became more mainstream, less of a cult. And it diversified. On any given day in the water now I'll meet three generations of surfers, male and female, everyone sporting a different craft. I started surfing in the 60s and I can tell you it's infinitely more diverse. It might be more crowded but it's also more interesting.

It's dark already and I'm out here again, talking, telling the story to the quiet night.