A smart cat once said, “Youth is wasted on the young”. How true it is! You eat crap, f**k anything that walks, crawls or slithers, drink like a maniac and drive fast and careless. From teenage-hood to your mid-twenties you will believe you are immortal. You will drive drunk, pick fights with the wrong people, and perform handstands on high-rise balconies. Most of you will survive. Some won’t.
But the one thing you’ve gotta remember amid all these good times is that one day you will be 35, 40, 50, 60 even. And the groundwork you lay down now will prepare your body and mind for the ageing process. It ain’t too cool getting old, but do the right thing now and it won’t be so rough.
- Eat good. Lay of the fried, greasy gear. Maccas and KFC actually taste better in moderation. Stuff like oatbran and bananas for breakfast, salad sandwich for lunch and then fish or pasta for dinner will feed and please your body.
- Wear condoms. It ain’t about AIDs or radical diseases that wreck your womb scraper, it’s about babies, kids. One unprotected spasm inside a fertile hole and you could be paying maintenance for the next 18 years as well as having the responsibility of a helpless human being on your shoulders.
- Work out a way to make money. There’s too many cats out there, 30-plus, who smoked weed and drank beer all through their twenties thinking they were somehow beating the system and who are now stuck working long hours in factories to support a family. Not all of us can be pro surfers but there are plenty of other cool gigs out there.
- Stretch. Who wants to be a bent old man that can’t get out of bed?
- Be kind to good friends. Remember birthdays and talk ‘em up when they’re not around. Always choose quality of quantity. Cool crowds don’t last forever. Remember those mates who you hung with before you were swept up with the groovies.
- Chill in the car and leave the tire-burning gear to the kids who don’t surf. They’ve got nothing to live for. You’ve got a lifetime of waves.
- Always but the best you can afford whether it’s food, coffee beans or a surfboard. Life’s too short to eat, ride F**k or drink crap.