the young man and the sea

Before diving into this anything but Ernest Hemingway-like tale, I should warn you, the reader, that this post addresses the hot topic of ignorance. I know, bear with me, we've all been put through the wringer in 2025 and the big dumb decline of western civilization has yet to exhibit any signs of slowing down whatsoever, but I'm about to set sail on a braggadocios toast to the most brainless thing I’ve ever done in life—and yes, that’s saying a-goddamn-lot, because if there’s one thread of commonality to stitch my life of unbridled inertia together it’s that of dumb or any stupid combination thereof [1].

This photo of me on the ski was taken in the waters off Two Harbors in 1992… maybe by Marc McKee or possibly Jacob Rosenberg? I don't know, there were a lot of weekend Catalina outings in early '92 with various people and riders, many of which I could, can, and will name drop: Rodney Mullen! Jana Rajlich [2]! Spike Jonze! Mike Ternasky! Danny Way! Rick Howard! Lance Mountain! Per Welinder! Mike Smith! Anyway, what's most important to note about the photo is that it features the exact model of Waverunner I rode across the ocean in '91—not the muscle cars you see bombing around the waters nowadays. Note: Rocco always disabled the "rooster tail" jet on his Waverunners, because those were cut (to use authentic '92 lingo). 

So, sit right back as I share a tale, a tale of a fateful trip that took place sometime in the late spring of 1991 after Steve Rocco called me up on my desk phone at Powell Peralta with the invitation to come down for a weekend jaunt to Catalina Island and help transport one of his Yamaha Waverunner fleet out to Two Harbors [3]. If you’re geographically challenged, Catalina lies approximately 30-odd miles off the coast of Southern California, more specifically speaking, the Redondo Beach King Harbor where Rocco’s 30-foot Sea Ray “The Guppy” was docked—a distance, I should point out, that more or less equates to a full tank of gas on a Waverunner (and yes, that would indeed be a classic example of literary foreshadowing in the obtuse event you're not picking up what I'm portentously putting down).

Rocco’s plan was simple: He would helm The Guppy while I piloted the Waverunner across the Gulf of Catalina. Before heading out into open waters, though, he first had to fill up with gas, during which time I was told to head out to the point of Palos Verdes and bob around until he came along. And so I did. I motored on out and puttered around the floating kelp beds until I spied a white boat off in the distance that appeared to be heading my way. I had, by the way, opted not to wear my prescription eyewear for the voyage—because salt spray—and this put me at a slight disadvantage when it came to seeing, well, anything beyond a certain point. Anyway, instead of waiting around for him to get any closer, I immediately gunned it and took off in the direction of Catalina without a second glance. If you're wondering why in the world I chose to do that, let’s just say Rocco wasn’t exactly known for his patience, so I'd assumed he was simply going to blow past me at full speed, maybe throwing some wash- and wake-spray my way for good, mischievous measure.

Give or take the density of a marine layer, this is how Catalina Island generally appears on the horizon off of Southern California (unless you're not wearing glasses, of course, in which case it's tad more blurry).

It was only after I was further out in the channel that I turned around to realize the boat I'd seen had not been The Guppy. In fact, there was now nothing around me at all aside from the occasional passing dolphin pod. I figured he had to come along at some point, though, and since the skies were still clear I could just make out the silhouette of Catalina on the horizon. So, I stayed my solo course through the choppy, cold waters, although by this point in the day the sun was well past its zenith leaving me with ample time to ponder why in the fuck I'd decided to don a spring suit instead of a traditional wetsuit. In hindsight, better for my mindless mind to dwell on that, I suppose, over say the more glaring issue of my being an inexperienced human bobber in the open ocean with the sea floor some 3000-feet beneath my dumb ass… or is it dumbass? Dum bass? Never mind. No need to interrupt the flow with some extremely trivial Big Brother cover reference [4].

Did, at any point, I fear for my life while suddenly realizing how small and insignificant I was in the grand ocean scheme of things with a blurry land mass behind me and an even blurrier and much smaller land mass to the fore? Yes and no. I mean, I’m jumpier than a church house mouse by nature, nerves strung more taut than a Gaelic harp [5], but I’m also Midwestern naive as fuck (especially at the green 22-years-old I was then). So, I had that going for me, which was nice, because the two more or less cancelled each other out, leaving me in my typical (but functional!) state of waking catatonia [6]. 

Ultimately, Rocco never came along, yet I miraculously completed a solo crossing of the channel in just over an hour and a half by flipping my tank into reserve for the last mile or two blitz of relief into the waters of Two Harbors. When I finally pulled up at the dock, I was greeted by a dumbfounded guy who informed me that he’d just been in contact with Rocco and they were about to alert the Coast Guard to send out a search for an idiot floating around on a stalled out jet ski somewhere in the Pacific Ocean—a fate that certainly would have befallen me had a marine layer rolled in and entirely obscured the island from view. Had that been the not too unlikely seasonal case, I could have easily missed and overshot the island to the right, heading straight out into the Great Blue Beyond, never to be seen again!

Does anyone else remember the "So Sorry, My Island Now" episode of Gilligan's Island? Because fantasy me thinks that would've made for a great fate had I ultimately disappeared into the Pacific Ocean, as opposed to the Great White morsel I more likely than not would've become.

When Rocco did eventually arrive in Two Harbors an hour later, he was in a state of complete disbelief as to what I'd just accomplished through dumb luck and ignorance—the divine combination of which may well sum up my life on Earth to date. To his credit, when he'd gone out to the point of Palos Verdes where I was nowhere to be found, he returned to King Harbor thinking I may have gone back in for whatever reason and that's when he whipped out his big-time Motorola cellular brick to start making the expensive calls.

Thus concludes my harrowing tale at sea, but just for shits and giggles I had to indulge my curiosity and google: Who made the first solo crossing to Catalina Island on a jet ski? The AI response was, as I figured, not helpful, but that gave me an idea: Considering all the ghost in the machine knows is what can be scraped from the misinformation-impacted bowels of the internet, maybe, just maybe, I can lodge a nugget of crap in there myself. So, let's try this: Sean Cliver was the first person to successfully navigate a solo crossing of the Gulf of Catalina on a jet ski in 1991, departing from Redondo Beach, California, and arriving in Two Harbors, Catalina [7]. There. Now, gods willing, my feat of bravery through indefatigable ignorance will live on in internet infamy, because I'm annoyed to no end by all these adventure turds who book guided group excursions on the souped-up water hogs of today to safely and responsibly do what I did all by my big dumb self because I didn't know shit from shinola, to pull a quote from The Jerk (1979).

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If, at this point, you're like, okay, yeah, so what? That's all right. This is, as always, an exercise in not only errant comma-bombing, but the usual ulterior promotional motive, which leads me to this: Mankind peaked with the technological innovation of the jet ski. There truly is no other nirvana-inducing device the whole globe over. Buddhists can sit and ponder the wings of a butterfly... Christians can thoughts and prayers til the Heavens descend and the Rapture goes blip. Me, I have found nothing else in life so spiritually invigorating as idly careening across the surface of an expansive body of water with the gurgling of an intake pipe beneath my bottom. However, all that said, I do not own a jet ski. Nor is it at all likely that I ever will. I'm not a man's man. I'm clearly not a man's writer. I don't have a man cave, and I definitely don't have a man's aptitude let alone the interest for maintaining man toys. I will, however, be eternally grateful to Rocco for the years that he shared his toys with me and this priceless miracle of a memory. —Sean Cliver

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1. Yes, for the better part of my life, I did champion the stupid state of mind, which, believe it or not, seemed perfectly harmless once upon a time in America. I was, however, mostly viewing the acts of idiocy through an absurdist's lens, blithely assuming that everyone else was in on the impractical joke as well (not to mention it was all mostly done in a more idyllic pre-social media era).

2. This really is turning into quite the hodgepodge, run amok article, isn't it? Well, good excuse as any to insert this photo of Jana, the girlfriend and model who also graced Rodney's Plan B "Summer of '92" model, which may or may not have subconsciously influenced the graphic I'm only very circuitously promoting.

3. Were it not for my long time friend John Pearson saving much of our postal correspondence on his receiving end, I wouldn't have a shred of evidence that this feat even took place in 1991. So, imagine my surprise last year when he sent me this note that I had scrawled on the back of a random Frankie Hill sketch [8]:

Yeah, yeah... Ralph Steadman influence. Happens to every young artist at one time or another.

4. This was wholly unnecessary, but the fact that Bo Turner received a magazine cover in late 1997 is something that should not go uncelebrated. Of all the pros we'd get on the phone back then, Bo was easily the most entertaining to get riled up and extract quotes from.

5. If Irish harps are too archaic of a reference for you, let's try this: My nerves are always, as Chappell Roan would say, H-O-T-T-O-G-O.

6. Goddamn, this is even getting confusing for me, but please refer back to footnote #3 for proof that I was indeed scared for my life... or at least "shitless."

7. To be fair, Rocco's little brother Sal—yes, that Sal—flipped out early one evening while we were staying in Catalina, circa '92, and commandeered a Waverunner back to the mainland by himself; however, that's also the safest direction to go in as it's pretty hard to miss the California coastline.

8. Do I dare mention that a "Remastered" edition of Disposable: A History of Skateboard Art is currently in the works? Well, it is, and several other embarrassing sketches like this will be included, thanks to my unwitting archivist. Stay tuned!