scuba stuff

Everett got to go scuba diving last weekend! He was so excited! For weeks he has been talking about doing it and asking when Paul could take him. For some reason, I thought the chatter would die down a bit after he went, but instead it's simply switched to how fun it was and how many fish he saw.

I've been diving too. I took Paul's scuba class over the past few weeks. In spite of some major stress over a few of the skills - well, one skill in particular, with a few different variations - I'm finally certified! I didn't like the pool sessions at all. There was nothing to look at and nothing to do except think about all the things that could possibly go wrong. That's a really bad train of thought for me because I have a great imagination when it comes to imagining the worst. So I was glad when we got to dive in the ocean and I had fish to distract me and remind me that it was actually going to be fun!

My first and second ocean dives were on the same day. And it was horrid at first - it had just rained so the water was really murky. It was so brown I couldn't see my hand when it was a foot in front of my mask. Then we moved to a clearer spot where we could actually see our limbs, each other, and some cool ocean-dwelling stuff. In my first two dives we saw a pregnant pipefish, a nudibranch, and a flatworm (kind of similar to the linked photos, but definitely not the same). There's no way I could have seen all that snorkeling. Honestly, I probably wouldn't have seen it anyway if Paul weren't there to point it out.

Then I had to wait a week until my third and fourth dives. I saw a crown-of-thorns starfish and a juvenile brushtail tang. I really love how some fish are so different when they are juveniles and adults. So now I'm certified and excited to go see all the interesting things in the ocean, but I have no gear so I can't really go diving much until I buy my own. I feel a bit like a 16-year-old with a new driver's license and no car.