PLEASE STAN BY

WATERS OF THE WORLD

The Black Sea. Was the water really black or was that just some name everybody agreed to before I was born? And what about the Red Sea... well, you get it. These were the conundrums of my 9 year-old mind. I figured that someday the only way I'd know for sure was to see for myself. And if it really was black I'd get a sample and start a collection of waters of the world. From all kinds of exotic places. The Nile. The Amazon.That sounded good to me at the time and then I forgot about it for fifty years or so.

I should mention that in one of those years I actually did get to the Black Sea. It seemed dark but not black, and I briefly remembered my childhood plan. Very briefly.

Everything changed when I was working in my garage one day in 2007. I was listening to the radio when  'Surfin' USA' by the Beach Boys came on. I must have heard the song thousands of times (even hearing it when it was a new release), but then the lyrics came to:

Haggerties and Swamies

Pacific Palisades

San Onofre and Sunset

Redondo Beach L.A.
All over La Jolla
At Waimea Bay...

Redondo Beach! I could start my water 'collection' right here in this 'exotic' place. Yes. And even better, I could make a small surfboard with the waters from all the sites mentioned in the song. So I did.

SURFIN' USA

My friend Eric and I even went around to the local sites mentioned and collected water samples but later
we figured it would be better if who ever wound up with this would have to fill 'em themselves. 

I also built a blue board:

And then I thought it would be great to have small individual boards for water from famous surf breaks from all over the world:

Malibu

                                                                          Zombies

                                                                         Manhattan

Narabeen

Teahupo'o

Haggerties

Redondo Beach

                                                                        Waikiki

These were harder mainly because the wood 'rings' that held the tubes had to be from the same plank as the board so they aligned visually.

By this time it made no sense to leave out a set for the oceans of the world:

And they're great for a reason: The Great Lakes:

And finally, the water that I always wanted to personally collect:

     LOCH NESS

                                                                

                                                                EPILOGUE


Maybe some people are disappointed that there is no water from Loch Ness in my piece. Well, I guess I am too. When I made this work many years ago I imagined myself on the foggy bank of that fabled loch with my test tube in hand smiling from ear to ear. But as happens with many plans, life got in the way. I got a lot older, my health isn’t what it used to be, this pandemic isn’t helping any and frankly other things became more important.

So while it might not be me who fills up this tube, whoever acquires this piece is getting more than a little box. It’s a challenge. And in an age where many people spend their lives staring at screens, a trip to the Scottish highlands will be worth its weight in gold.

 

There’s more of my work here:

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E-Mail: SResnicoff@aol.com