It was a three-year forced commando march, with a 75-pound pack and tight shoes, to get this bastard of a project online. I loved it. Except when I hated it.
As you can imagine, by this time much of the surrounding EOS terrain isn’t quite as interesting to me as it was back in 2009, when I first set out. I’ve read too much, seen too much. I go into a mild narcoleptic state now when I look at a perfect photo of a perfect wave in perfect shades of blue. Do anything for three years straight, weekends and holidays and anniversaries and your kid’s birthday included (sorry again, Jodi and Teddy) and the burnout comes off you like coffee stink.
Yet many parts of EOS, a surprisingly big number in fact, still sparkle, even to my jaded yellowing eyes. Here are eight of them:
1: Bobby Brown and Kevin Brennan surf Tallows, from Hot Generation
From the EOS Facebook Page. Two of Australia’s hottest young surfers, riding together in 1967, nobody else in the water, just around the headland at Byron Bay. Both died young—Brown just a few weeks after this footage was shot, glassed to death in a ridiculous bar fight. It’s impossible that any clip could be this sad and this joyous. I’ve watched this thing a hundred times, and it still makes my want to cry and surf forever. And yes, the song “Orange Skies,” by Love, is a little slice of pop heaven.
