How do I start? How has life led me from being that person - literally stomping through corporate boardrooms, determined to make a living to survive, to seeking and embracing the dark side of the underwater world?
Don't get me wrong; while the underwater world mostly has a dark side, it is also filled with the most unbelievable rays of light piercing through the euphotic zone - the upper 200 meters of the ocean floating above the deeper twilight zone where light doesn't penetrate. Snorkeling, bright and early, allows me to witness the morning rays diffusing into prisms of light. It is something very humbling that this decision to follow our dream, hopefully using wisdom has enabled us to experience. It is also the place where I am the object being filled with light and with hope. Life, having dealt me some unexpected curveballs this year, has resulted in my seeking the solace of the ocean. Not only to be on it, but also in it. The depths allow me to think and acknowledge feelings that feed my soul and calm loss somehow, for that moment, fades away into the depths. Here I find pleasure in living this beautiful existence.
Moving to living on the sea was not an easy decision, leaving family and friends and at that point didn't totally make sense as it was such a great, scary unknown and would we love it or even like it? It took a while to adapt—influenced by much lack of sleep and natural fear—but as our skills and trust in the solid construction of GypsyDjango increased, so did our love of the ocean.
A major change from living in the city was switching from wearing earplugs to sleep, drowning out the noises of people and traffic, to wanting to hear the lullaby of nature’s sounds. I began to tune into a strange snap, crackle, and pop sound. I could hear the ocean floor, alive—and to me it sounds absolutely amazing, like music.
Because I loved this sound and spent nights being calmed by the life alive at night below me, I researched and discovered that the snap, crackle, and pop sounds are produced by snapping shrimp. These small marine creatures create a loud snapping sound with their claws, used to stun prey and communicate with other shrimp while producing a distinctive crackling noise commonly heard by sailors and divers in shallow coastal waters. It has been so loud that recently my brother in law, Damian, was running around the boat in the middle of the night trying to find a non-existent water leak as he panicked that our precious drinking water was running into the sea. Not finding it he went back to bed to be tortured for the remainder of the night.
This love then progressed into snorkeling, soon followed by underwater cave exploration. Since then I have become braver and able to dive deeper for longer, where I begin to feel the thrill and the weightlessness. Rather than focusing on my troubles and sadness I can focus on my immediate surroundings and feel one with the ocean.
It's a different world. To me, it is like leaving Earth and finding a new, totally different, planet where we are just visitors. Not touching the earth or leaving an impact, but spending a moment in time with one sole purpose.
Sometimes my fascination with the depths has been such that I failed to notice the cold until my body began to violently shake with chills. Sadly I knew it was time to return to reality.
At the beginning of the season, I feel scared and claustrophobic, but by the end, I want to see more, go deeper, and feel more alive. The fear never overcomes me; it simply sharpens my senses and makes the water, the color, and the marine life intangibly sweeter.
My sister Vanessa was equally proud and terrified of the pictures I shared with her when I dived as deep as I could, using most of my available breath, allowing myself just enough spare to safely get back to the surface.
I don't know where I am going, but I have goals. At this stage it's another meter, a weight belt (I don't know why Kevin keeps saying “no!”), and definitely bigger lungs.
And somehow, down there, the loss doesn't seem so deep, my sis. Within the music of the sea, the underwater orchestra, I can almost hear you and feel you, and my heart fills with joy.
Comentarios