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I had always hated gym class and yet, here I was on holiday, in beautiful Australia running up and down the beach in a wetsuit. Watching my new fit friends glide gracefully across the sand that just pulled me into the earth. I gasped for air not knowing if I wanted this warm up to be over or if I wanted it to go on forever. I knew what came next was something my friends were excited for, but I may have spent a good portion of my time agonizing over. The waves, which seemed far from beginner mocked me as they violently crashed with rage against the gray sky. The long surf boards lay cozy on the sand. The cold air was the only thing that made me excited to get into the ocean. The warm up continued on into stretches and yoga poses that challenged my balance, which to be fair is non-existent. I went into surfing well aware of what I probably could and couldn’t do. Yet I did want to try, and since it was packaged into my tour I figured I had no reason to not try. Then we got onto the board. Lay. Push up. Jump up. Repeat. We were surfing in sand that felt like it was going to sink our board. Once deemed ready, it turned into a free for all where the 20 of us and our surfboards rushed to the water. I would say we waited for our first wave, but the reality is the waves were smacking us right away, making it a challenge to get deep enough to even attempt to catch a wave. The water was clear. Free of seaweed and fish. Thank goodness! I have an irrational fear of fish, and when I say fish, I mean even the tiny ones, and not just the big deadly ones! Although who isn’t a little nervous about Sharks? I look at my board that is tugging at my ankle. It might be ready to take a wave, but I am far from that as I wonder about how I am supposed to get on. I try pulling myself up from the side but obviously anywhere you put a bit of weight the board sinks down. I don’t like the idea of sinking at all! So this freaks me out and I’m back to square one wondering how to get on this lovely and quite large floating board. I find out that it’s about being quick. The sooner you balance out your weight, the sooner you are ready to paddle and get the wave. Or let the wave get you?! So i'm just kinda floating around happy and proud I even achieved this when one of the coaches takes notice of me. I think they knew without a push I wasn’t gonna go far. So I get pushed and from there the wave takes me almost all the way back to shore. It was terrifying but fun. The rest of my time surfing, I lay on my board and let the wild waves push me around. I knew that standing on the board my first time was most likely not going to happen and I am proud of just trying. Our two hours of surfing quickly disappeared. It felt like I had just gotten in when we had to go out. Hugging our surfboards we lead them away from the beach. Exhausted and thrilled we chatted away about our cool experience. A few of my friends had made great progress and ended up standing on the board a few times! I may have come into the water absolutely terrified but I left cheerfully and full of laughter. I would be sore for a few days, and the bruises may not have totally disappeared after a few weeks, but the memories of that day will last forever!