NIGHT DIVE!

Yesterday Noe asked if we wanted to go on a night dive he going to do on Thursday. Ron and I agreed. We only have to pay for the tanks, we are just meeting him and some people on the beach here and walking into the ocean.
A night dive! I wanted to try one this summer when the bioluminesence happens. But I will jump in and do this now. That special effect isn't supposed to start until some time in June.
However last week we were at the pier at night and saw something glowing and moving in a straight line in the water. My guess is a jellyfish. It was blinking, so I could track where I saw the flashes to figure out where the next blip would be.
It's very exciting. It will be like my very first time. Because it's been over a month since we last got in the water. And it will all feel new and weird because it will be dark. I want to try it though, because diving truly helps me to be in the moment. It helps me thoroughly assess what I'm seeing, feeling, hearing, and tasting (salt water mingled with nerves). It helps me to totally dump my brain of all the other parts of life like finances, or health goals, or my past or my future. When I'm under water I'm only ME. Me and my next breath. Not a Mom, not a wife, not a Canadian/American, not an anything. I'm just a woman who is getting a glimpse of another world. I'm a woman who is facing my fears to go where I've never gone before. It's about learning to prepare for the worst, and feeling confident to handle tough things.
Diving is never just about diving. It's about making friends, and making memories, and doing the impossible. Diving is learning more about myself. Diving is learning how to handle anxiety. Diving is about pushing the boundaries of what I thought I knew. Besides being it's own big education with all of the science involved. Diving is believing in myself, saying what many people cannot: I can do it! I had to believe that before I could even sign up for my first class.
So many moments of "I can do it!!!!!"
In two days I'm going to go swimming with the stars!!
This will be my 9th dive, all in the Caribbean Sea.
Here is what's freaky about scuba diving. SCUBA means Self Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus. It can also be defined as a my underwater life support. So every time I dive I am putting myself on life support. Which is why it's so intense. It pretty much defies logic (and nature itself) for me to be down there among the fish and other creatures at the bottom of the sea. Diving is about having the knowledge to make sure I don't drown, usually for about an hour at a time That's just weird, if I think about it like that. Yet everyone says that it's so relaxing. In fact my manual says if you aren't relaxed, don't dive. It's supposed to be fun. It's a trade though: sure I can call myself a diver, an ambassador to the underwater world. I also have to factor in so many things just to stay alive in that alien world. Yet people do it all the time, all over the world, sometimes in incredible conditions like in freezing water in the Arctic. For some reason this form of insanity appeals to me. I'm not sure what that says about me. (Not the Arctic diving, no way! I am nervous about the extra training and knowledge just to use a dry suit for cooler waters like diving off of Vancouver Island where I grew up)
A typical scuba kit is four equipment systems integrated into a single package. Learning to dive means learning that the four parts include a BCD which means a buoyancy control device, it holds my kit together, like a life jacket that I can add air from my tank as needed.
Then there is the tank, the cylinder, the thing that contains the air supply I need to stay alive. It's under high pressure, and can have 2 different types of valves and 2 different units of measurements. Here in Mexico I'm not even sure how to describe which tank I used. Was it the metric system where cylinders are referred to by their internal liquid capacity? I'll have to ask my instructor, who I now consider a dear friend. The metric system is totally different from the imperial system where cylinders are referred to by the amount of air held when full, if you release the air at the surface.
Fortunately, this is all the kind of science that I find very interesting.
There is the whole understanding of buoyancy and trim and using weight to float juuuuuuust right. To sink when I want to go down, to be suspended in the water at the right level, and to ascend when I need to get to the surface. I've only gone down as far as 60 feet, there is more training to go down farther than that. It feels like learning a form of magic, to go to new worlds, to levitate, to interact with new life forms I've never seen before.
The last part is the complicated part. I put together my knowledge piece by piece, but a book will only get me so far. The last part of the scuba kit is the regulator. The whole kit is fairly basic, but there are so many things that need to go just right. However the more I dive, the more I train for handling things.
It was not at all easy or graceful on my first 3 dives. It was a matter of faith keeping me going. Then it became easier, and more fun, not just me being a pile of nerves. If I hadn't learned to be comfortable with my own unease, I never would have made it. I'm thankful I didn't let that stop me. I felt like a hot mess during my first dive. It was also a bit of an adrenaline rush that I survived my first attempts at doing the impossible. It felt near impossible, no matter how many people have done it before me.

June 17th, I did it! It was totally amazing. I managed to talk myself out of being nervous, so I went in only being excited. It was a big deal for me to chose to trust Noe and Sarah. I ended up doing a private dive. Noe is my friend now, he only charged me 300 pesos, which is $15 USD. Sweet deal! So we met by the beach at 7pm as the sun was setting. We chatted with some people and set up the gear. The light was starting to fade by the time I was strapped in and walking into the water from the beach. It's still warm here, it was still at least 90 degrees when I suited up, so getting into the water was refreshing. The sargassum was better, we only had to walk through a few feet of it. We went to the cenote dos ojos. It's where the underground river pops up in the Caribbean sea about 40 feet from shore. Just a small hole maybe 10 feet by 5 feet? We went on a lionfish hunt! They are an invasive species here. Noe had a sling, and I spotted the first one. We found 5 in the hour we were down there. It was only about 20 feet at the deepest. I was so busy remembering how it all works and then all of a sudden I couldn't see anything. It was strange.
I could almost see better though, if that makes sense. I had a good flashlight and I could only focus on what my light revealed to me. Most of my attention went to the coral, and not touching it as I went by. Noe caught 2 lionfish and then fed one to a moray eel, which was pretty cool to watch. The fish wasn't all that big, but with the venomous spiky fins rays it was an impressive feat for the eel to get it in it's mouth. Oceanservice.noaa.gov says that these fish threaten native fish and the environment. Noe says: lionfish ceviche tomorrow!
I saw a lot of cool fish, it was amazing. Then when we came up to see a strawberry moon rising above the horizon like pure divine magic.

It's now June 29th, and I haven't had time to add to this post. I thought I would post it today anyway. Life is so strange right now. We flew back to the US, saw family in Apple Valley California, family in Las Vegas Nevada, and then on to Cedar City Utah. A string of new memories as I fly through days of familiar places. It's very surreal. Two new grandbabies! Who has time to write? I think I will start a new blog just for them. My precious little angels. They really make the past and the future crowd in together as I look into their eyes. They make me feel like those blue irises are a seer stone. Wait, that's another post.