The low tide was a minus one point seven at five to six that Saturday morning in April, and if he was going surfing, Soc Smith wanted to be in the water by a quarter to six, so he was up at five oclock. He'd loaded his board and wetsuit into the station wagon the night before, so all he had to do in the morning was drive down to the beach, and if it looked good, put his suit on and throw his stick in the water. Since he didn't have to go in to work that day, he could conceivably stay in the water for as long as the sets kept coming through. Friday night he'd told his wife Jayne that he'd help her with her yard work in the afternoon. However, if he surfed till noon as he'd wanted, he'd be too tired for the yard work. He no longer had the pep he'd had as a teenager and young man.

There had been a gentle sprinkle the night before, so the lawns and streets were glistening with moisture as he drove to the beach. There was only a scattering of clouds, and they were moving slowly east, leaving the sky clear. His headlights cast two narrow, shiny funnels onto the pavement in front of him. When he got to the cliff, Jesse Vaca was pulling his Chevy truck into a parking space just ahead of him. His board was in its bag in the bed. Soc pulled in beside him, and they got out of their cars together and walked over to the edge of the cliff to look at the waves. As early as it was, it was quite warm.

"So, wha'da ya' think?" Soc asked as they stood gazing out at the surf under the dawning sky. Nobody was in the water, but a few other surfers were standing on the cliff checking it out, too.

"It's not lookin' too bad," Jesse said. "I think I'm go'n'a go out."

"Yeah? It doesn't look that good to me," Soc said. "I came by yesterday on my way to work and it looked pretty good. Better'n this. That's for sure."

"Look at this set. Some nice little ankle snappers there."

The mountain ridge across the bay to the east was beginning to show some color. The sun peaked over the horizon at the slot where the Salinas River flowed into the bay. Tiny, one-foot waves creamed into the sand below. One surfer was making his way down the steps. At the bottom he attached his leash to his ankle and walked on the sand along the cliff until he was knee-deep in the water. He slid onto his board when the water got to his upper thighs. Soc and Jesse watched as he paddled to the outside.

"That's it. I'm goin' out," said Jesse.

"I think I'm go'n'a pass."

"I'm go'n'a give it a try. If nothing else, I can paddle around."

"Hey, go for it. See ya' later."

Backing out of his parking space, Soc saw Jesse take his board out of the back of his pickup and remove the bag. He headed out to the point to see what it looked at the Lane. After he rounded the point at Indicator, he could see that the waves at First Peak were a little overhead and looking glassy. He'd never surfed these waves. They were too big and too fast for him, and the guys who surfed them were young, aggressive kids. Too competitive, no fun. Many's the time when he'd stood on the cliff at the point and heard some young buck in the water hollering an obscenity at some other young buck for some silly infraction the latter didn't even know he'd committed. And on the nicest of days, too. He rounded the point and was on his way back home.

He pulled the car into the garage. An old rusty hamster cage sat on top of a case of motor oil on the floor against the back wall. He inched in slowly until the rubber ball that hung from the rafters touched his windshield. He got his board and wetsuit out and stored them on the rack and in the cabinet he'd made especially for them.

It was almost six-thirty, and Jayne was just getting out of bed. He went into the bedroom through the sliding glass door off the patio. He took his shoes off, put on his fleece-lined slippers, and went through the living room out the front door to pick up the morning newspaper. He tossed the paper onto the dining room table as he went into the kitchen and started boiling water for a cup of hot spiced cider. He warmed up a couple of bran muffins in the microwave and used the left-over spiced cider water to make a cup of instant oatmeal. After he got everything set up on the dining room table, he sat down and spread out the front page of the newspaper, and, as he ate, he skimmed the front section of the paper.

By now Jayne was bustling around the kitchen brewing a pot of coffee. She kissed Soc's bald spot as she went to the spare bedroom to turn her computer on. She communicated by email every morning with their daughter and her cousin in Portland.

"No surf?" She asked.

"Nothing worth getting wet for."

"Oh, I'm sorry. I know how antsie you get when there's no surf."

When she returned to the kitchen, she put some food out for the cats, filled her coffee cup and went back to her computer. The cats were all that was left at home. Soc's daughter, Caroline, was a college junior in Massachusetts.

Soc only skimmed the headlines of the first section of the paper. If he saw a story that interested him, or if he knew the person the story was about, he'd read a paragraph or two to get the gist. Then he'd move on to the last two pages for the political cartoon and the vital statistics. He skimmed these religiously every day looking for familiar names among the births and divorces. When he'd go to the obituaries, he only read the ones of the people who were younger than he was, curious to know what killed them. Soc looked at the first obituary in the upper left hand corner of the page, and to his astonishment he read: SOCRATES SMITH

No services will be held for Socrates Smith who died Friday after a short illness. He was 53.

A native of Los Angeles, he lived in Santa Cruz for twenty years. He was employed by a Scotts Valley electronics firm.

He is survived by his wife Jayne and his daughter Caroline Smith.

Contributions are preferred to The Surfrider Foundation.

He couldn't believe his eyes. He was so shocked that he couldn't tell Jayne what he was reading. All he could do was chortle. He wanted to call out to her, but couldn't. He was stuck somewhere between laughter and a heart-sinking feeling that something was very wrong, and he might not be able to fix it. Finally, he caught his breath and said,

"Hey, Babe. You might wan'a come in here and take a look at this."

She must have heard some urgency in his voice because when she got to the dining room table, the casual Saturday morning look on her face had changed to panic.

"What's wrong, Honey?"

"Check out my obituary."

She quickly read through the item in the paper.

"My God, Soc," she said. "What do you suppose it means? It's got'a be a mistake. Let's get that newspaper on the phone and find out what the big idea is."

Just such innocent statements from Jayne were what endeared her to him. Whenever there was something that was seriously wrong, she was going to make it right, and she'd take on a determined little-girl we-can-conquer-the-world attitude, and by God it'll get straightened out, or else!

"I think it'll have to wait till Monday," Soc said. "There's probably nobody there today. I don't believe this. Who do you suppose wrote that little blurb? Must be a practical joke. Someone's messin' with me."

That's what he said, but he wasn't sure he believed it. When he stopped talking, he realized that he'd been rambling, and he knew it was only because he was confused and unsure of what was going on. Then he began to wonder if Jayne detected this uncertainty in him, but he couldn't tell, so he just kept to himself as he got into the comics.