Ellen McLaughlin

Ellen McLaughlin, the middle of nine kids in a Polish-Irish family, emigrated from her surf town of Manasquan New Jersey to Santa Cruz.  We met at a rugby game while I was nursing my first solid concussion; she was 18, I was 19.  We were together for 26 years.

Ellen was whip smart, funny, adventurous and an all around badass.  We moved to the Hollister Ranch full time in 1985 where we got married, dug ditches, built ferrous cement water tanks, ran an organic farm, shared one beat up truck, and homesteaded with gardens, poultry and a baby calf.  We founded Island Seed and Feed in Goleta and Ellen developed the most unique organic nursery on the Central Coast.  Tavis and Sabina spent a fair amount of time there, contained in cages of pet food sacks eating dog treats and fresh herbs.    

Ellen was many things to so many people; above all she was a really good mom.   There was a winter when she put Sabina in a backpack and took Tavis by the hand and hiked from the house high up our muddy road to a car in the rain, drove to the Gaviota Creek, then walked across the train trestle to the highway to get them on the school bus.  She was energetic, creative, loving and fierce.

When she got sick…. well she was really really pissed.   The cancer devoured her once, and then again.  Her world became colorless; vague shades of grey.  

Until The Friendship Paddle.

Yes, it was a fundraiser, a mind blowing respite that covered bills and allowed me to stay at home with her. 

Moreover it was color.  In the portrait of Ellen every paddler on that pier at Betchers, every wipeout in the potato patch, all of our sweat and our salty tears filling the channel, they all colored her world.   Together WE filled the rose of her cheeks and the blue of her eyes and the vibrance of her soul.

WE did that, together.  That’s just what family does, and WE are The Friendship Paddle family. 

Ellen was a hell of a badass, and she grew a couple of badass kids.  We think of her every single day, in that salty bittersweet way. 

So the next time we’re together let’s raise a blue bottle, whisper a prayer, take a hit and give her and all those we love a great big TFP thumbs up.