Pittwater Life January 2023 Issue

When asked what work he is most
satisfied with, he responds: “I’m not
really satisfied with any of the work
I’ve done, it’s been a constant process
of failure.” This serves to engage him
further in his writing process, embracing
Samuel Beckett’s tenet “Fail again. Fail
better.”
A driving force in his writing is to “cut
the crap” and get to the “heart of things
really fast”, as is seeking to understand
his subject matter. The 2013 biography
TC, Tom Carroll was ostensibly Tom’s
story, but writing it enabled Nick to
“explain something to myself” about the
way both their lives had unfolded. He
reveals much of himself in the book and
unflinchingly explores the uglier parts
of not only Tom’s, but also his own life.
The ugly. The joyful. The unexpected.
The metaphysical. Nick talks about all
these things as we sit in his tidy but
homely office, his new Border Collie pup
not far from his always bare feet.
What about surfing? This act he has
fashioned his life around. What does
surfing mean now?
“I’m not really obsessed by surfing
anymore, but I’m deeply engaged with it.
I try to hold it really lightly in my hand
and I hugely enjoy it, now more than
ever, I think.”
He’s in the water most days – his car
parked near the peak or surf club – but
the way he is in the water has changed.
Rather than gripping on tightly – like
a toddler unwilling to part with a toy
– he’s loosened. This is when he gets
metaphysical:
“I get a lot of memory from going
surfing. I’ll remember waves from 30 or
40 years ago while I’m riding waves now.
It spills down through my experience
of the water – and I allow it to do that –
which I probably could not have done 10
or 12 years ago.
“I’m able to enjoy the sight of other
surfers around me a lot more than I
ever could. I used to hold the act of
surfing close to me and not really want
anyone else to have fun. That’s not true
anymore. I’m quite happy to surf with
anyone.”
What he does in the water has also
changed over time, in unexpected ways.
Upon returning from California, his
daughter Maddie immersed herself into
nippers at Newport. Nick noticed many
of the adults were communicating a
fear of the ocean to the kids, stemming
from their own inexperience. He sensed
a lot of the kids were “itching to do a bit
more”.
So, Nick and a couple of others
began running board paddling and
swimming sessions, setting up courses
and encouraging kids to do things “they
didn’t think they could do”.
“I really learnt the lesson about how
important it is to subject yourself
to frightening – yet actually safe
– experiences when you’re quite
young. You gain resilience in passing
through that: fear turns to elation and
excitement, which is enlightening,” he
says.
Mucking around with the nippers on
‘clubbie’ boards coincided with hearing
about a Hawaiian board paddling race
from Molokai to Oahu. Nick and Tom
were bored with pro surfing’s stagnancy
in the early 2000s and thought “Let’s
do it!”. They bumbled through their
Continued on page 38
Life Stories
CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT: Riding down the line at Jeffreys Bay, South
Africa; with some of the Newport Kinghorn Surf Racing Academy
team; with lil brother Tom heading down the beach at Waimea Bay
in Hawaii on a pretty big day; with Tom and big sister Josephine
and their surf mat, Newport Beach 1967; surfing Newport Peak
in 1981; taking notes at a Pipe event; surfing at Bells Beach;
sharing a wave at Newport circa 1980.
The Local Voice Since 1991
JANUARY 2023 37