Editor’s Note: Have a question for Dibi Fletcher? She’s definitely got answers. Or at least a perspective. Don’t hold back, shoot her a DM on Instagram and ask away. Here’s this week’s dispatch from the Matriarch of Radical…
I’m 67 and still surf regularly. Last winter I paddled out on a day I would have considered ordinary twenty years ago. Halfway outside, I realized I was over my head. Nothing happened, I wasn’t hurt, I just turned around and paddled in. I’ve been embarrassed about it ever since. Was this an instance of knowing my limits or not pushing hard enough through them? – Turned Around in SD
Hey Turned Around in SD… Sometimes it takes more courage to turn around when every bit of your ego tells you to paddle out. There’s a difference between gaining judgement and losing your nerve. At twenty-five, we test ourselves because we don’t know our limits. At sixty-five, we’ve earned the right to know them. You didn’t fail that day, you read the ocean and yourself and made the educated decision to paddle in. That’s called Experience…
Hey Dibi… There were six of us who surfed together for nearly forty years. One moved away. Two can’t surf anymore. One died. Now most mornings it’s just me and another old guy sitting where our whole crew used to be. Sometimes I look around the lineup and feel like a stranger at my own beach. How do you keep the stoke alive when the people who made surfing great aren’t around anymore? – Last Man In the Lineup
Hey Last Man In the Lineup.. The circle of life that nobody warns you about. We think we’re attached places, usually we’re attached to the people who inhabited them with us. Keep paddling out with your remaining friend, learn the names of a couple of the kids sitting farther inside. Your old crew isn’t replaceable, but the circle doesn’t close because it seems to have gotten smaller, it’s just evolving.
Related: Hey Dibi: Why is Confidence in the Lineup Mistaken for Experience?
Hey Dibi… I’m no 63 and have been surfing since I was fourteen. When I was young, men in the lineup noticed me because I was a woman. Now they often paddle around me as though I’m not there. Funny thing is, I’m a much better surfer now. Why does becoming invisible bother me when I should be old enough not to care? – Still Here Aussie Gal
Hey Still Here Aussie Gal… Being overlooked doesn’t stop stinging just because you’ve accumulated birthdays. But there’s an upside nobody tells you about. A sense of freedom you never have when you’re young and being noticed. Now surf your waves, you know where to sit, you know which set is yours, you know what you’re capable of. Let them underestimate you, then take off deeper!
Hey Dibi… I was somebody around my local surf spot once. Not famous, but good enough people knew me. Now I’m 60 the kids paddle around me because they assume I can’t make the wave. Part of me want to tell them who I used to be. That’s pathetic, isn’t it? – Used to Rip
Hey Used to Rip… Not pathetic, just human. But don’t tell them. Nothing ages a surfer faster than constantly explaining how good they used to be. Your history belongs to you. It doesn’t require witnesses. Every once in a while, when the right wave comes… show them.
Related: Hey Dibi: Are Wave Pools In The California Desert Legit?
Hey Dibi… I’m 61 and realized recently that I’m now “the old guy” at my local break. The younger surfers re friendly enough, but sometimes I catch myself correcting them; etiquette, boards, history, everything. How do you become an elder without becoming the guy everyone wishes would shut up? – Enough with the Lectures
Hey Enough with the Lectures… Easy, wait till they ask. One of the privileges of age is having answers. One of the disciplines of age is not giving all of them. Young surfers deserve the same opportunity we had to make mistakes, develop terrible taste, think we invented everything, and eventually discover that we didn’t. Be available, be generous, and remember: wisdom offered at the wrong time sounds exactly like a lecture and puts you immediately in the old A-Hole category.