It’s curious when you meet someone and it turns out that your paths never crossed but had been very close parallel lines.

One of the older guys that brings boards by the shop for laminating, Chuck Vinson, spent a few hours at the shop doing some special resin color and line work on one of his boards this week. We met last year when he first came to inquire about getting some glass work done and when he introduced himself mentioned that he was a laminator at MP during the Saticoy days. So we started chatting about when he worked at MP… he started right after I left… and what he did after that.

Turns out that after he left MP he went up to Santa Barbara and started a shop there, as well, eventually went to the North Shore and worked there. On the North Shore he worked for Lightning Bolt. The board he was working on at the shop was a Lightning Bolt replica for wetsand. While on the North Shore he worked and roomed with one of my high school surf buddies, his name was Wayne. Wayne’s mom used to take us to surf that I mentioned in this blog entry.

So Chuck is a guy that started working on surfboards when he was in high school, like me. Then works at MP only starts working there shortly after I leave. Then goes up to Santa Barbara and starts a shop. I worked at Wilderness in Santa Barbara. Then goes to Hawaii and ends up rooming with one of my high school surf buddies. Our paths finally cross almost 40 years later when he comes by my shop last year. I enjoyed reminiscing with him.

The Reminiscing kept going too because Nat Young did a presentation and book signing at Ventura Surf Shop Friday 3/7. Because Nat and Mike Cundith were buddies he used to come stay at the Rincon Valley ranch house when he was in California. I hadn’t seen him since August of 1969 when he came to the house, so I made sure I was at the event. The presentation was great and the book ‘The Complete History of Surfing’ is excellent.

D.R.