Age works as a sort of grindstone for surfers. Think of it like this: we’re a big, soft ball that’s made up of three layers. The first layer is all smiles and giggles and blissful ignorance about just how kooky we are. Then, as we age, that soft outer layer wears away, exposing a harder, crustier layer. It’s salty and sometimes bitter, stoic and proud, and can be entirely unaware that they were themselves, until very recently, engulfed in their own soft layer. That second layer is a thick one, too. It seems to last for many surfers’ entire surfing career, their failing bodies betraying them before they get a chance to get to the core—the place where the real soul of surfing (if there is one, that is) seems to reside. That core takes the youthful optimism of the first layer and realizes that surfing isn’t meant to be a miserable, angry ride. It’s meant to be a joyful, simple thing. To take it too seriously is to make it worse.
https://www.theinertia.com/surf/meet-80-year-old-kevin-merifield-was-humble-surfing-royalty/
