City Smart / How to thrive in the urban environment of Southern California : More Than Just a Volleyball Game

In our collective consciousness, the Venice-Santa Monica Boardwalk is a place of icons--an epicenter of California culture. Here are the mesomorphic in-line skaters. Here are the tattooed “gangstas.” Here are the panhandlers, with lobster-red faces. And the man who juggles the chain saws for the slack-jawed tourists. Colliding in one crazy, funky melange by the sand, all who tread here will leave with a memory.

I suspect, for most, the boardwalk is a sunny and unnerving oddity, a place that can simultaneously amaze and appall, like an over-able contortionist.

Funny that it’s here, not far from the madding crowd, that a bunch of us have found something slow and comforting and eternal. Simply put, it’s a volleyball game. But, somehow, it’s become much more.

We arrive early Sunday morning, before the winos awake, with a net and a couple of balls. There is the ritual of laying out our encampment--umbrellas, chairs and towels. Buckets and shovels and plastic dinosaurs for the kids. And a half-dozen bottles of sunscreen. Hopefully, Phil has brought his chocolate chip cookies. But as the crowd straggles in, there might be a basket of strawberries too. Or bags of scones or bagels.

Everyone knows someone, but this square of sand is the only place most of us will ever come together. The majority are married, with children. But as we warm up there are enough singles to debate the relative hardships of a hard night drinking versus a hard night changing diapers. We begin to bend and pull and even groan a little at the excruciating joy of stretching hamstrings folded too long beneath the office desk. Someone’s shoulder emits a satisfying pop.

A couple of our crowd played volleyball in high school or college. The rest just picked it up, hanging around. We play doubles and we’re competitive. But friendly. You might be teamed with Hugh, the tall, bald actor who has been cast, more than once, as a psychopathic killer. Or with Moira, the mom whose dinks and verbal barbs are equally wicked. Or with Peter, whose round figure and knee brace belie a knack for massive court coverage. Or with Rick, who directs television movies and dives madly to keep the ball off the sand.

For 20 minutes or so, until someone gets to 15, one of these people will be my undying ally. They’ll call me god, mutter insults toward the other side and promise to put the next set closer to the net.

If you are lucky, you’ll have the honor of facing the reigning monarchs of our sandy domain--Greg and (the other) Moira. They’ll beat you, with modest smiles, then offer to watch your kids so you can take it out on someone else. At day’s end, as we collapse the umbrella and pack up the plastic brachiasaurus, Moira mentions that the days are growing longer and that a game might even be possible now on weeknights.

My mind lurches in quick and hopeful calculation: Can I make it from the office to my place by sundown?