Mike Black is a Cal­i­for­nia surfer who pro­duced and starred in the cult surf film “Inva­sion! from Planet C” and is fea­tured in the much antic­i­pated “Jazz The Glass” – a pirate-themed movie. He is also the cre­ator of the pop­u­lar blog “Surf A Pig” that extolls the virtues of logs with wide hips.

What was your life like grow­ing up?
Priv­i­leged. Back in the day, my dad would take my fam­ily and I to the beach to body­surf every Sun­day. We lived in Hous­ton at the time. As we were going over the inter­coastal water­way lead­ing to Galve­ston (a long bridge that at its high­est point was about 40 or 50 feet off the top of the water), he’d stop the car, pull over to the side and say, “Okay! Who wants to jump off?” My brother and I would almost start cry­ing. My mom would just sit there qui­etly shak­ing her head, let­ting her hus­band have his fun.

Finally, for my 15th birth­day, my mom let my younger sis­ter play hookey from school. They drove to Galve­ston and picked up my first surf­board. Since I was too young to drive, I was always try­ing to bum rides to the beach. My father drove me to the beach so much back then—from Hous­ton to Matagorda. Then, he would just chill and wait. He made me go out to the outer sand bar. He told me to quit play­ing around on the inside. He is the rea­son I quit spong­ing and started surf­ing. I am so lucky to have the sup­port­ive fam­ily I have.

When did you get your first surf­board?
1987.

What was the feel­ing you had when you first stood on a surf­board?
Frus­tra­tion. I stood on my surf­board and rode in the foam straight to the beach quite a few times before that first real ride. Now, once I had that first real ride, that was when my life changed. Once I felt the power of a wave accel­er­ate me beyond the effect of grav­ity, slid­ing me down the drop in, I was hooked!

Who did you look up to and admire when you were a young man?
My grand­mother. She is an amaz­ing woman that has seen so much. Her per­spec­tive on the world is spot on. She is an amaz­ing artist.

Rumor has it that you, a math teacher, came up with the idea for Inva­sion! from Planet C as a way to explain cer­tain the­o­ries to your stu­dents. Is this true?
Not exactly. I had been frus­trated with the nature of “surf movie”. My room­mate at the time was watch­ing piles of them. I’d walk by his room and ask him what he found so inter­est­ing about the films. He didn’t really have an answer. At the time I was act­ing in David Potter’s film projects. I decided I wanted to make a surf film. I went to David and asked him to help me. My orig­i­nal “idea” was some­thing more akin to Sies­tas and Olas. He said no because my pro­posed idea lacked the essen­tial ideas to make a story worth watch­ing. I didn’t give up. I was teach­ing at a high school, at a com­mu­nity col­lege, and sculpt­ing, paint­ing or draw­ing every night. It was a very busy, cre­ative time for me.

One day I was teach­ing my fresh­man kids how to prove the quadra­tric equa­tion. Right in the mid­dle of the proof, I stopped and wrote a two-page bul­let point out­line for the story. It included the name of the char­ac­ters and the title of the film. It broke down the story—all except the love ele­ment. That was David’s deal. So, it’s not like the story explains a the­ory, but rather dur­ing an expla­na­tion of a the­ory, I thought of the story.

Where did you come up with the idea for Jazz the Glass? How did you get per­mis­sion to use the footage from an old black and white pirate movie with Charles Laughton?
Jazz the Glass came to me on my ride to work. My part­ner, David Pot­ter, had acquired the film through pub­lic domain; the film com­pany never chose to rein­state its copy­right. He had a script writ­ten for it. He wanted me to read a few of the parts way back when. After releas­ing Inva­sion! from Planet C, we wrote a script for this pri­vate eye piece. We started film­ing the surf­ing for it. When we got back from film­ing some of the surf­ing, David decided the logis­tics of a full on movie was not get­ting him stoked. So, we had this surf­ing footage and we had this pirate film. It was nat­ural. David sent me his orig­i­nal pirate script and the film. I re-wrote the story to make if fit “stoke min­ing”. David and I passed it back and forth until it became what it is today.

Of all the places you have trav­eled to, what place in par­tic­u­lar stands out and why?
I love Costa Rica. I can speak enough Span­ish; I know the coun­try. It’s warm. It’s afford­able. I am a crea­ture of habit in that regard.

Who/what inspires you?
Logic inspires my decision-making. My wife inspires me to be less selfish.

What is the great­est thing you have learned in your life?
Every sen­tient being is con­nected. If every­one knew this, we would live a dif­fer­ent life.

Do you have any regrets or wish you had done some­thing dif­fer­ently?
Sure. There are those ani­mals and peo­ple I have not helped. There are all those waves I didn’t go on that I prob­a­bly should have.

What are you most proud of?
I am so proud that I had the where­withal to lis­ten to my par­ents when I was grow­ing up.

What mean­ing does surf­ing hold for you and how has it changed your life?
Surf­ing, to me, means rid­ing a wave on a surf­board. Noth­ing more, noth­ing less. These movies and every­thing they have brought are just dis­trac­tions. I don’t need to get the deep­est bar­rel. I don’t need to do the most rad cut­back. I don’t need to get the longest noseride. I am grate­ful I have a life that allows me to spend the time in the water I get.

What brings you the most hap­pi­ness in the world?
Har­mo­nious rela­tion­ships. I am happy when I honor my wife. I am happy when I know my fam­ily is healthy and happy. I am happy to have the friends I do.

Who are some of the peo­ple you feel are shap­ing the path for surf­ing today?
Gene Cooper, Chad Mar­shall, Miki Dora, Joel Tudor, and Chris­t­ian Fletcher. These men’s con­tri­bu­tions to surf­ing are cur­rently defin­ing where things are going today—in my eye.

What is your favorite board? Your favorite surf spot?
Gene and I are design­ing a Coop­er­fish Black­board. It’s a tra­di­tional pig pushed through Gene’s magic. That is my favorite board. It is some­thing I am so lucky to be a part of and some­thing I am incred­i­bly proud of.

My favorite surf spot is an enigma. There are spots that have the shape, but the crowd ruins them. Mal­ibu, Sand­spit, Rin­con, Cap, and Poles all come to mind. There is this spot on the Oso Penin­sula and this other spot on the main­land across from the spot on the Oso Penin­sula. Those spots are prob­a­bly my “favorites”. They are super long, per­fect, warm and uncrowded.

In 20 words or fewer, tell us why every­one should “surf a pig”?
I’d pre­fer every­one not surf a pig. More peo­ple should short­board. Pig boards catch too many waves.

What’s your favorite meal?
Cur­rently, a nice salad. By nice salad, I mean one with meat and cheese, nuts and organic greens.

What are you cur­rently lis­ten­ing to on your iPod?
Bas­com Lamar Lunsford

What causes/organizations do you sup­port?
None. I’m not a joiner. I don’t believe in putting my name on a list to help this or that. Some orga­ni­za­tions out there are ones with a cause worth sup­port­ing; that much is cer­tain. How­ever, every orga­ni­za­tion will ulti­mately do some­thing I dis­agree with, hence my reluc­tance. Fur­ther­more, help­ing one thing might hurt another. I help my com­mu­nity immensely with my cho­sen profession.

What are you most grate­ful for?
The love and sup­port of fam­ily and friends.

What’s next for Mike Black?
Many things. I hope to be start­ing a fam­ily with my wife in the very near future. I have this Black­board with Gene in devel­op­ment. We are launch­ing Jazz the Glass this month. I am cur­rently writ­ing an arti­cle for Slide mag­a­zine. Stoke Films, LLC might launch this Bollywood-style motor­cy­cle bounty hunter surf story project.

My pro­fes­sion keeps me chal­lenged and rewarded. I am a can­di­date for a fel­low­ship for Tal­ented Youth instruc­tors. That has me psyched.

A future full of pos­i­tive, cre­ative endeavors—that is what is next for me.

Learn more about Mike Black and his films at his web­sites, Jazz The Glass and Surf A Pig.