Sink, Swim or Surf

Disclaimer: My son is on the Long Beach High School surf team (the first in New York State), and that makes me a proud surf mom. By definition, it also makes me a surfing advocate. Go team!

Nonetheless, I have to admit that the sudden surfing craze in LB is making me very nervous. The $1 million Quiksilver Pro NY competition, which is contracted to take place in LB this September, is about to put our barrier island on the international surfing map. And that will only mean one thing: a deluge of surfers swarming our fragile beach, and not just during the competition, but forever after (Long Beach is a heck of lot closer than Montauk for people from the city and even for most Long Islanders). Residents: prepare for the onslaught!

Among the distinct possibilities:

• Out-sized commuter crowds, especially on the Riverside to National stretch of beach.
• Litter - on the beach, on the streets and on private lawns.
• Parking wars.
• Traffic - coming, going and circling.
• Mayhem on the waves, resulting in injury and even (God forbid) fatality.

 And for those of us who live in the prime corridor connecting the LIRR to the beach:

• Pedestrian armies blocking the intersections.
• Trampled lawns and trampled strangers perched on curbsides and property lines.
• Overflowing trash receptacles on street corners.

In addition to these injuries, we may well sustain the most mortal of insults: being squeezed off our beach by visitors and forced to emigrate westward for more peaceful sands.

The Crew (sans Egans)

The Final Trek: Labor Day 2010

As far as I'm concerned, the only reason to live in Long Beach at all, the only possible excuse for paying the exorbitant taxes that we endure, is the right and ability to stroll three leisurely blocks due south, to cross under the boardwalk, pass the lifeguard shack (Hi, Paul! Hi, Frank!) and plotz in "our spot," the one we've been gravitating to since our kids were small, along with our neighbors and friends. The one where anyone in town knows they'll find the Gelfands, the Cabasinos, the Conners, Egans and Akalskis, without even asking.



The prospect of losing that legacy is just too sad to contemplate, too unacceptable to even take seriously. So for now, I'll just keep my eye on the doings of the newly sprung Long Beach Surfer's Association and my ears open for hints of what's to come. Let's hope it's not a wipe out.