Talk about a true Waterman.

Talk about a true Waterman.

By Tim Houts

December 13, 2010

I remember Earle Wellsfry from my rookie summer. It was my first time running relief. It was either big yellow or solid red flag surf. I come running down to the tower at South Crescent Bay. The guard isn't there. The waves are huge. Thick, heavy waves, as I'd learn later, like that always at Crescent Bay. But, as a rookie, the adrenalin is pumping, and I feel like I'm about to piss my speedos.

I look out at the water, and a monstrous set is pounding through. Inside the impact zone is the lifeguard, Earle Welsfrey. He's holds two kids wrapped in his tube with one hand, and a third tucked in close to him with his other hand. The wave crushes down on them. They disappear beneath the towing white water. Then, a moment later, pop up in waist deep water, closer to shore. He holds his ground with the three against the rush of the back wash, and walks them out, like a giant bear cradling three dolls. One lifeguard. Three rescues.

He comes to the tower. Makes a casual comment. Then laughs a deep, jovial chuckle from his large frame. Strips to his speedos and heads out to body surf during his break, repeatedly dropping in backwards into huge faces.

And later, after I'd become a regular guard working Crescent, often, I'd see him walk down from his parents house up the hill. He'd have a Hawaiian sling spear in one hand, and mask and snorkel in the other. He'd disappear into the water briefly, before emerging with dinner, a nice halibut, or corbina. It was as though he were the embodiment of Neptune himself.

(FYI, my sister Cindy got acquainted with him a few years back, when she found his vacation rental on vrbo. It had been his parent's duplex, right at the top of the Crescent Bay ramp; and after their passing, he came back to Laguna after living somewhere else (Northwest?), bought his siblings out, and moved in with his family upstairs and rented the downstairs. I met him again when Cindy was there, maybe five years ago. I recounted this story to him. As is often the way of the older guard/rookie, he didn't remember me, or that day. But, he laughed his jovial bellow as I recounted it for him. And, he looked almost exactly as I had remembered him, with his large, stout build, and reddish brown hair. And that jovial bellow of a laugh. Classic.)

Stay huge men. Everyday. Charge it.

Tim Houts