Katie Berry, second from right, meets some of her former Hungtington Beach High School coach Andy Verdone’s, right, current surfers in Huntington Beach on Wednesday, February 15, 2017. Katie’s friend Wade Carden, third from right, looks on. (Photo by Paul Rodriguez, Orange County Register/SCNG)
The Orange County Register
By LAYLAN CONNELLY / STAFF WRITER
Katie Berry slowly stretched out her pinky and thumb, her three fingers in the middle still folded over her palm, and threw up a “shaka.”
In the surf world, it’s a gesture that means “hang loose,” a quick, casual sign of happiness, stoke, joy.
But for Berry, 25, a once avid surfer and part of the Huntington Beach surf team who now sits in a wheelchair, barely able to move, the small hand movement means more.
It means hope.