Got into bed at 10:30, setting several alarms for 3:30 AM. My dive bag was mostly packed, but I hadn’t had the chance to double check it or make sure I had my “shore diving” bathing suit (a two piece that ties in the back so I can stealthily take it off without offending anyone’s delicate sensibilities. Every piece of equipment I use has a specific purpose and a specific benefit, while there is clutter in other areas of my life, my gear is a finely honed machine, or at least I do my best to keep it that way.) In my shore diving bag there is also a CPR mask, clothing scissors, my shark repellent band, and other gizmos of various kinds.
As I arose I thought, only diving will EVER get me out of bed when I am this tired. And so it did. I smiled and took it as evidence that I am indeed in the right field of work. I double checked my bag, changed clothes, repacked my backpack that had just come back from Orlando and headed down to Long Beach, arriving at 5:00 AM. I was just about to take my tank out of the car when the host of our clean-up group, Max, said oh no, the charity paid for you all to rent tanks and weights when we get there. What luck! I don’t have to schlep this thing from here to kingdom come? Fantastic. In the car it stayed as I socialized with my group. My job was to supervise two high school students, just newly scuba certified. Our main fella Max took 3 students, and another divemaster named Leslie took two. Leslie works at Aquarium of the Pacific and is best friends with Brook, the senior octopus keeper and good pal of Geanie the giant pacific octopus. Geanie, I am told, did not like people at first but now she is extremely friendly. I promptly of course asked Leslie if the aquarium was hiring. Sadly she had no information but said she would love to shore dive with me as we social humans like to do, as well as introduce me to her boss, who is the lead bird and mammal supervisor. What will come of it I don’t know but I am happy to open any universal doors to potential employment.
The channel was as smooth as glass and the sunrise a very deep, striking pink. The type of pink that leaves you dumbfounded and looking for whoever side–swiped you. We got to Catalina in no time and we went to our cleaning area, which is “Green Bay.” That is the area of Avalon just next to the green pier. We had an hour and a half to kill before being allowed in so a young student and I went to the fancy coffee place “Catalina coffee and cookie company.” It was there I had the most delicious albeit expensive breakfast sandwich of recent memory. Vegan cheese, vegan just egg, and vegan spicy sausage on a croissant. The stuff of my dreams. This sandwich despite being obtained on trade of the entirety of the contents of my bank account perked me right up. The island looked very green from the rains, All the hues of every tree were punchy and bright and happy to be alive. After eating my sandwich, so was I.
The young student I was with was all excitement and questions. It was fun to answer them. She held me in great esteem for some reason. If she only knew what a ridiculously bad diver I had been two hundred dives ago.
I set up my gear leisurely but the tank I was given was aluminum. This I cannot abide. The dude, or dudette in my case, does NOT abide aluminum tanks. After you breathe them down you just pop right to the surface in an annoying and uncontrollable way. Unfortunately there was no alternative. Darn it, I will persevere despite my sneering distaste for this Toyota corolla of tank styles. Cheap, mass-produced, practical but somehow in an unpractical way.
We entered the water at 9:30 AM and were told we must be out by 11. The two students and I entered the intrepid deep. That sounds very dramatic but the ‘deep’ was no more than twenty feet. I just thought it sounded fun to say.
Interestingly there were many sheep crab about, taking their morning strolls, saying hullo to the neighborhood. I kept a respectful distance but my two student companions wanted to take pictures with it. They got as close as they dared, and the crabs did not go into “size up” mode, which meant they felt pretty relaxed despite our presence.
I found a few bits of plastic and such. My great prize was a paddle board fin. Huzzah! One less piece of plastic nonsense to disintegrate over 1000 years and poison every living thing within 1000 miles.
This group was actually from another charity that Max was sponsoring, called Diversity Divers. This teaches inner city/lower income kids and/or kids of color how to dive. I was very happy to be helping this sort of effort.
We got out at 11 and being extremely tired I employed the help of one of the charity supervisors to help me get up onto the beach. My whole body was screaming. Despite that I had been invigorated by the dive, and the sun was coming out. My favorite dive day is a sunny one.
I got out of my gear but then someone mentioned we could go down to Casino point for a second dive, as our ferry didn’t leave until 3:55 and it was only noon. Well darn! Why didn’t someone say so before? I would have left my sandy, wet attire on and not changed into cozy dry clothes. I tried to resist not diving because all the work had been done of putting my things away and peeling the cold clamminess of neoprene off my skin, but the visibility was TOO GOOD to pass up. Eventually I began waddling over to Casino point.
We were given free t-shirts for our clean up efforts and a raffle ticket, for what I don’t know. A booth for the clean-up in the middle of the town square was none other than Captain Seamus Callaghan, a friend and a well-connected fellow. We chatted a bit, mostly about the Peace and the fate my former friends had brought on themselves. I also asked after his new Long Beach boat with the incredibly stupid name, The SoCal Diver. It’s like naming your cellphone, cellphone…
Anyhoo, apparently the boat’s not making much of a profit. Both of us weren’t surprised. Hard times are hitting the dive industry this year, it seems.
A few new friends including two folks I had rescued off the Peace were at Casino point. They were happy to see me ( always a nice feeling) and were happy I had come to dive with them before we had to catch the ferry. The two folks I had rescued told the story as if I was a great, ancient hero of yore, a title I really don’t feel I deserve with my body being this tired. I spent $30 getting a different tank and weights from this new location on the island, but it turned out to be the best $30 I had spent in months.
Absolutely INCREDIBLE visibility. The water was such a bright blue, the sun just illuminating everything, the red algae leaping out and declaring its presence with bold colors. I sat on the bottom a while and made friends with a calico bass. They have the prettiest eyes to me, they are a neon blue. My assigned dive buddy and I enjoyed kicking around the park, passing the ruins of an old Cessna on the northeast corner. The kelp was healthy, the fish were plentiful. My favorite kind of dive.
One of the students was really having a problem staying horizontal in the water. I grabbed her hand and tried to have her hold still. Her flailing was not helping her cause, so I gestured she should breathe and just try to get her buoyancy under control. My advice had no effect.
Half-way thru the dive, we lost two of our party of 8. The instructor gestured that I should take my buddy and do a square search pattern, and we did so. We couldn’t find them and my buddy had less than 1000 PSI left, so I gestured it was time for us to get out. Happily the instructor had found the missing parties, so we all reunited at the surface, happy and carefree as the sun lit the water all around us with glittering gold.
Leslie and I hit it off on the way, sitting out on the sun deck of the Catalina Express. I remarked that this was the type of day that would almost make you believe in God. I meant that I was grateful for a glorious day like this, and she liked the phrasing. There are days where gratitude doesn’t come easy, we are wrapped up in the little ways our world is not going according to plan. Then there are days where the gratitude comes naturally, punching you right in the chest and knocking the wind out of you. I was so lucky to have such a great day.
A quote has been going through my head lately. “You cannot conceive, nor can I, of the appalling strangeness of the mercy of God.” Appalling strangeness is really resonating with me. It’s odd how life changes, and it is all for our benefit, whether we perceive pain or pleasure from the experience is irrelevant to the ultimately beneficial outcome.