Jersey Shore Magazine

BEACHCOMBER continued from page 21 photo by Gordon Hesse by waves streaming down Trenton Avenue to Barnegat Bay at the next high tide and making an island of our house. Later that day, I heard my mother talking on the telephone, trying to soften the blow to an oceanfront homeowner who called to find out if it would be possible to retrieve items stored in their garage and basement that now existed only in memory. It would be another fifty years before Sandy would exceed that level of local destruction. In the aftermath of that storm, I spent weeks helping neighbors clear debris as my parents borrowed funds to raise the foundation of our rental cottage. Summers were the height of living for a pre-adolescent: plenty of kids arrived for their oneand-two-week vacations; I got to swim, dive, and ride waves on inflatable rafts, and lounge on a towel, often with a group of friends who were there for the warmer weather. Summer jobs were working at the Hob Nob in Lavallette and selling the dozen New York, New Jersey, and local newspapers at a stand. I worked at Flo's Drive-in & Bat'em Out in Ortley, the Treasure Chest Gift Shop on the Seaside Heights boardwalk, and Scott's Sweet Shop next to the Lavallette Post Office; establishments that are gone. Later on, I became a lifeguard: it was the pinnacle of happiness. The job had responsibility, but also provided prestige and unusual authority for an eighteen-year-old. Whereas before I went to the beach to enjoy myself, now I got paid to watch humanity from a high observation post and swim, row surfboats, and surf. As a young adult, I couldn't ask for anything more. I also got lessons in the folly of human behavior and j e r s e y s h o r e • s p r i n g 2 0 1 3 This view from Trenton Avenue in Lavallette, eight weeks after the hurricane, shows the power of the ocean to uproot whole sections of the boardwalk's bolted beams and damage to homes that were protected by bulkheads. The piles of "dunes" were constructed from the sand that had washed down the streets. 22 Waves are a kinetic and plastic sculpture that can be not only intrinsically beautiful but also a source of challenge. Ask almost any surfer about a shore break he or she has experienced, and you are likely to hear lavish descriptions of their power, form, majesty, dangers, and addictive thrills. True sailors harness the wind and strive to channel it upon that intersection with water to strike a desired course. We sometimes pay a high premium just to look upon water, as Hurricane Sandy proved to so many who lived nearby the ocean and bays. Living On The Edge For most of my first twenty-five years, I lived on the edge of the Atlantic Ocean. We lived just seven houses down from the dunes and the ocean. My earliest memories include lying in bed at night and listening through the open second-story window to the hiss of the waves and the gurgle at the shoreline as I drifted off to dreamland. Until I completed first grade, we only spent the summer at the Shore, then my family moved from Roselle Park to live all year long in our summer home in Lavallette. I remember being lonely there the first winter: the summer resort was deserted after Labor Day, and at school I was the "new kid on the block," not an established "clamdigger"—a native raised there. In time I became acclimated to the change and won acceptance. As I grew older, after school I would spend late afternoons beachcombing to see what the ocean had spewed upon the sands and wonder about the ships on the horizon and their destinations. I learned to scan the sands, shells, and surf; this helped me to develop observation skills to look for anomalies and potential hazards. This would prove helpful in the future when I became a lifeguard. I also witnessed hurricanes and experienced three days of the ocean's fury in the March Storm of 1962. I saw twelve-foot waves crash into bulkheads, splashing higher than the rooftops of three-story buildings. I saw playmate Billy Fremonte's home slide into the ocean followed

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