I want to go diving again.

When we were out for Sara’s birthday last weekend, at one point when we were BS’ing with the other couple at our table, the topic of scuba diving came up. I told all of my fun stories that I remembered from long ago – seeing baracuda and nurse sharks and eels in Florida and then returning back to Michigan to dive with basically nothing. The ironic punchline of the whole thing is always that I moved to the Tampa area so I’d be close to the water for diving, even though I’ve lived here for 7 years now and haven’t done anything of the sort since…

To add insult to injury, I pulled out my old dive log off the shelf this morning and realized after flipping through it that I technically haven’t been diving since 2000 – over a decade!!! Sure, I guess I’ve been “busy,” but sometimes I look back at diving much like playing the guitar and it’s another one of those things that I really miss doing, even though I have no idea when I’d have the time to do it anymore these days.

Of course, the truth of the matter is that I’ve got a ways to go before I think I would let myself go out again. First and foremost, I’m not doing so great with my weight right now, and I can only imagine how much lead I’d have to be carrying to actually get my fat ass down to the bottom! I don’t want to make this post about being overweight, so let’s just say that there have been some advances recently that I’m really hoping are going to help and leave it at that.

Secondly, in addition to actually losing weight, I kind of need to get comfortable with the water again. I’ve never really been super comfortable being in water over my head, but somehow during the dive class that I took over a decade ago, everyone managed to help me calm my nerves in deep water at least when I had my gear on … maybe it helped decrease that whole fear of drowning – I don’t know! That said, having been away from the hobby for so long has definitely caused that fear to return – specifically, I had a couple of problems when went snorkeling during the cruise last year, and even the deep parts of the lazy river over at Stormalong Bay at Disney make me nervous, even with lifeguards literally every five feet along the wall.

That’s basically two things that I know I need to work on if I want to don a regulator and explore life under the sea again. I think I can do it – the weight loss coming before the swimming proficiency – but it is something that I’d like to start working more actively towards, maybe next year. Sara has expressed an interest in diving as well, so it could be something cool for us to do together, plus I know that my old dive buddy Tim would love to do a little exploring the next time he’s able to bring his family down to visit.

One last reason that I want to get back into diving – this entry this I found in my old dive log:

6/21/98 : Davis Reef – Islamorada, Florida
Best dive so far!!! Saw a nurse shark, two eels, two lobsters, and Buddha! Tons of beautiful fish…

Who knew I’ve been a Buddhist all this time?! Apparently only King Triton and his court.

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