While some people baked sourdough bread and cut their own hair during the COVID-19 pandemic, David Litt, a former speechwriter for President Barack Obama, picked up a far more dangerous hobby. “Learning to surf is like learning a language that wants to kill you,” Litt writes in his new memoir, It’s Only Drowning, which he discusses Nov. 6 at Bookshop Santa Cruz.
For his third book, following 2017’s Thanks, Obama: My Hopey, Changey White House Years and 2020’s Democracy in One Book or Less: How It Works, Why It Doesn’t, and How Fixing It is Easier Than You Think, the author chronicles the year and a half he spent surfing as a novice while connecting with his brother-in-law, Matt, an avid surfer. According to Litt, the two are polar opposites, especially socially and politically. But instead of looking for common ground, Litt finds neutral ground, at least in the water, and in an increasingly divisive time in America.
“What started off for me as a book about surfing really became about an unlikely friendship,” Litt says. “I think there’s lots of people who have written first-person books about surfing. But I don’t think anyone has written a memoir about learning to surf as a grown-up.”
A Yale graduate, Litt worked as President Obama’s speechwriter for four years, including writing for the White House Correspondents’ Association dinners. He also was the Washington, D.C., editor for Funny or Die, and briefly contributed to Billy on the Street with Billy Eichner. Matt, on the other hand, is an un-vaxxed and conservative-leaning electrician by trade. He sings in a ska band and likes death metal and Joe Rogan’s podcast. Litt listens to Lizzo, Stephen Sondheim and NPR. Their only shared love is of Taylor Swift.
While Litt was experiencing lockdown-induced depression and anxiety over the fate of the country, he noticed that his brother-in-law was flourishing. So in early 2022, at the age of 35, Litt started taking surfing lessons in Asbury Park, New Jersey, where he lives with his wife. He even attended a surf camp in Costa Rica and injured his nose.
“In parts of the country, there was this kind of uptick in people learning to surf during the pandemic,” Litt says. “These people were looking for something to do where you could get outside and could get in the water. I was at a moment in my life where I needed to try something new, but was feeling pretty adrift. And I think, ‘Well, that seems like the least me thing I can be doing where I would definitely get myself killed.’ And I think that was very appealing at the time.”
For Litt, surfing is a communal experience. For Matt, it’s about “rugged individualism” and “self-reliance.” But the two became surf buddies, keeping their conversations to small talk and visiting beaches and wave pools in New Jersey, New York, Texas, Spain, France and their ultimate destination, Hawaii’s world-renowned North Shore. In Santa Cruz, they surf famous locations like the Hook, Steamer Lane and Pleasure Point, and hang out downtown and in Capitola.
“It was definitely one of the most fun parts of the trip, and one of my favorite places I’ve ever surfed,” Litt recalls. “It was the first place I’d really been where surfing was fully a culture, rather than a subculture, like it is in New Jersey. It came at a moment when I was starting to feel just a little more comfortable on a surfboard and I could enjoy myself and not just be trying to avoid falling. For me, Santa Cruz is associated with those first couple of times when I rode a wave and it was just really fun. The waves, the conditions, the vibe. It was the place where I first felt the pure, unadulterated freedom and fun that you get from surfing that’s so addictive.”
Along the way, Litt learns to forgo some of his liberal attitudes toward Matt and accept their differences. As long as they’re in the water, he writes, life is good.
“When I started surfing with Matt, I assumed we would end up realizing that we agreed on all kinds of things, which really meant that he would end up agreeing with me,” Litt says. “That’s not what happened. We’re still very different people. But I am certainly a more courageous, open-minded and flexible person when it comes to how I think about the world and my own life. I think I learned all of those things from him, not because it turns out that we’re actually totally alike, but because we’re still pretty unlike.”
David Litt discusses his book with Hilary Bryant at 7pm on Nov. 6 at Bookshop Santa Cruz, 1520 Pacific Ave., Santa Cruz. Free. bookshopsantacruz.com
