The Doc Paskowitz interview

Dorian ‘Doc’ Paskowitz is a man with few regrets. At the ripe old age of 87, he’s got a pretty good perspective on what life is all about (the good life, anyway) and he’s not afraid to share that wisdom with the world.

Back in the sixties, the Texas-born doctor packed up his clan (wife, eight boys and one outnumbered girl) boarded a motorhome and hit the road for a life spent chasing waves. Having tuned in and dropped out, the Stanford-trained doctor traded in fixed abodes and regular paycheques for a vagabond life, but ended up becoming a surfing pioneer of political proportions. The Paskowitz Surf Camp, founded in 1972, etched the family’s name into surfing’s history. But it’s the footprints Doc left in Israel that reverberate a little deeper. Last year, the Jewish granddad journeyed to Gaza to deliver a dozen surfboards to Palestinian kids as part of Surfing For Peace, an initiative he co-founded with Kelly Slater.

When HUCK caught up with Doc recently, he had more than just a few pearls of wisdom to share. Here’s what happened the day Doc Paskowitz turned the questions on HUCK.

HUCK: Hi, is that Doc Paskowitz?
Yes, yes, yes… I didn't expect a lady! Well Andy, it's very nice of you to call. Andy, now listen, let me ask you a couple of questions. Number one, what is your last name?

HUCK: My last name is Kurland.
Kurland? And where are you calling from?

HUCK: I'm calling from London.
[silence] I'll be darned. So you're part of an organisation? A magazine?

HUCK: That's right, HUCK magazine.
Now tell me Andy, if you had to choose first amongst the equals – of skateboarding, surfing and snowboarding – what would it be?

HUCK: On a personal level, snowboarding.
And for all the surfers in the office, would you give them my Aloha and tell them the water is still cold here in California – warm in Hawaii, but not as cold as I'm sure it is in Cornwall. Now, I've taken too much of your time. My time is your time from now on.

HUCK: I wanted to find out more about the lifestyle change you made in 1958, when you decided to move away from the conventional life of a doctor and Stanford graduate to embark on the nomadic life of a travelling surfer with your wife and future nine children in tow?
Andy, I have to kind of explode that theory. You journalists get hooked on something and pass it around like measles. The truth is I cannot see any lapse, I can't see any division, any dichotomy, any space between before 1958 and after 1958. The only singular thing was that I met my beloved wife.

I have been a beach bum since I was twelve years old and it's never changed. On top of that, I became a lifeguard, and a research physiologist, and then I became a medical doctor. But you know Andy, it was all what you might call T-shirts on top of a bare-skin beach boy.

HUCK: What is it about your philosophy on life that allows you to be all these people at once?
In keeping with what you might call the premise of HUCK magazine, there is a core – a central power point in my life that has just moved everything, and that has been surfing, every aspect of surfing. The days when I've been out in big waves and thought 'Am I gonna get in alive?' to the days in my eighties when I say 'I'm gonna die just paddling out.' It doesn't really make any difference whether it was the first wave I rode or the last wave I rode. Even when I'm not riding waves I'm thinking about surfing.

So I would say that if I had one philosophy in life, it would be surfing. I know that sounds rather inflated, but it's not. It's moved my whole life, anyone who's really dedicated would feel the same way.

HUCK: What is it about surfing that drives some people to root their life and philosophy around it?
Of course, that's an extremely difficult question. You had a wonderful scientist by the name of Sir Isaac Newton. He described the laws of physics, and I know it took a lot of thinking on his part to describe it. I feel that's almost like what you're asking me to describe to you – what is it?

I can only say this to you, and I hope I'm not being too pompous when I say it: there is an addition to the forces of the cosmos – like gravity, magnetism or light – there is another force and its one that we think of as extremely unique. We call it life. But it's not unique at all: no more than gravity's unique. People don't go around saying 'Guess what? Gravity only applies to Philadelphia, they don't have gravity anywhere else.' It's not so. I believe there is this other force, this vital force, called life. It gets inside a person, you use it for a while, and then you have to give it up. So it goes onto something else or someone else, but for the time it's there it's really there. When you judge life versus no life – there's a hell of a lot of difference between being alive and dead. Now that force – life – is somehow supported and prospered in the act of surfing.

I know it's kind of a pompous, long-winded explanation. But in this cosmic force we call life, nothing, I think, prospers from it more than being out in the ocean and riding a wave, especially a big one. And by big I don't mean sixty foot like my little Jewish friend rides, just big enough so that you get that feeling. I wouldn't be surprised if there were times when you're snowboarding that you get that same feeling: 'I'm more alive now than when I started this slope or when I finished it – in the midst of it, in the centre of the act I am more alive.' Is it alright for me to talk to you in that way?

HUCK: Of course. How important was it for you to share that discovery with your children
It was the same way as one of the Rothschilds might wanna share banking with their kids, or I don't know like… like your Queen! [laughs] She'll say to her daughters 'Be Queenly, because someday you may be Queen.' And that's what I say to my boys 'Be a surfer, because someday you may be a surfer.'

HUCK: Was it important for you that any of them were successful on the professional circuit, or were you just happy to see them find their own way?
Andy, I've got to admit to you, I was a real asshole in that regard. I was so, oh gosh, I was screaming, hollering, running along the beaches, threatening the judges and balling the hell out of my kids… I was terrible. I wanted them to win.

One day I said to a really great surfer, the father of the world champ Tommy Curren, Pat. I said to him one day deep in Mexico: 'Pat, do you get all pissed off when Tommy doesn't do what you think he oughta do in a contest?' he said, 'No. I never saw him.' I said 'What! Pat you mean to tell me you never saw your son, a world champion, you never saw him compete!' I was different from this guy, but I was terrible and you can quote me.

Now, one thing I must say on my behalf: all my children still surf, we all still surf except mom, and I don't care how they surf, where or when, just as long as they surf. Like yesterday, my boy Abraham went surfing, and I was so thrilled: 'Abraham went surfing! Were the waves good? Yes, yes. Did you have a good time? Yes, yes. Oh great Abraham went surfing!' Once, I was a real horse's ass, but now I'm a real loving father when it comes to surfing.

HUCK: As much as you spread the love of surfing to your own children, what motivated you to take that same discovery to people in Gaza and Israel?
You know, Andy, it turned out to be a fantastic media issue. Over a billion people saw us give those boards in Gaza. It was just a few months ago. It didn't start off with a billion people in mind – it started off very simply. We saw a picture of two guys in Gaza, who were Arabs, sharing a surfboard. My friends and I – we are Jews – we just said 'Oh hell, that's no good. If they want to surf as much as we do, we just gotta go get them some boards.' So we did. That was the end of it for us – that was the beginning of it and the end of it. Then the media got in there and it became an international thing. And you know something, it does have some international reverberations to it. The guys in Gaza are just going ahead leaps and bounds, and they're grateful that we Jews gave them their boards.

HUCK: And what does that make you feel about the power of surfing? Do you see it as a great equalising force?
Oh yes. Listen Andy, in order to answer that question I want to tell you about a book I wrote all about that. It's called Surfing and Health and you can get that by going to a… website… is that what they call it… called alohadoc.com. It explains how these things mix together. Everything from taking out people's appendix to helping a young kid patch his board. I put down all the wisdom I got from the waves and from surfing into this book.

HUCK: How would you sum up how all those things interconnect – especially in the case of a socio-political situation like in Gaza? How does surfing, health, religion, conflict and peace all interconnect?
Now Andy, you realise what you're doing? You're asking me something that is harder than Sir Isaac Newton. You're asking me about 'The Theory of Everything' – like your great guy, the great physicist Hawkins.

What happens is: You fall in love with something – it's as simple as that. It's love. That's it – it's a four-letter word. You fall in love with something and you love it very dearly. The more you love it the more it loves you back. After a while, the feeling becomes so abundant that you have love leftover to trade – not to trade so much as too share – with someone else. And in that process – of falling in love, loving, being loved back and sharing the love – all other things take place. That's the closest I can give you to the theory of everything…

I wish you'd read my book. In fact, if you like it, review it for me! Because it's made to keep surfers surfing and it contains so much great wisdom that I've learnt from surfing in the water. In fact, there's a slogan in the book that says… aaah… I can't even remember it. Oh!... No, I can't remember.

HUCK: Through the book and from the film Surfwise, what message do you hope people take from how you've lived your life?

No listen Andy. Up to now I've been relatively… what would you call it… normal. But now Andy, we're going to veer a bit from normalcy. First thing: I wasn't interested in that film, I didn't want it made, I refused to have anything to do with it. Secondly, I've never seen it and I don't intend to see it. And third, it goes against my grain that such a thing exists. And I know that sounds very kooky to you, but that's not my style. My style is to talk to you, not about films, but about me and my love for surfing. Can you see the difference? I mean, I don't mind my talking to you about the very personal things in my life that guide my destiny, and even the destiny of my family. But , I'm not interested in somebody else describing what I do and how I do… but anyway! My wife likes it and my kids like it. My wife wants to know, did you see it? Now remember Andy you need to write me or e,e,e, e-mail me. Now promise me, Andy, after you've read the book and seen the movie, you'll write me a little note and tell me what your thoughts are.

HUCK: I promise.
And if you think the book can do what I think it can do – really enlighten surfers – then I want you to spread the word.

HUCK: Looking back, are you happy that you've spread the word?
Oh yes Andy, I'm happy with my life. I'm so happy with it. I'm 87 years old, I still surf -- and I don't surf as much as I used to. You know, 87, what the hell? How long do I have. I'm sure gonna miss it, I'm really gonna miss it. It was a great life.

HUCK: Any final message you would like to share?
There is a wisdom in the wave – high-born, beautiful – for those who would but paddle out.

For more theories on life, surfing and the cosmos check out Doc’s book Surfing and Health available through his website.

Surfwise, a documentary chronicling the life of the Paskowitz family, is now out on DVD.

For more inspiring tales of people living the good life check out Living The Dream in HUCK #011, the Scott Bourne issue.