First Time For Everything - Open Water Diver's First Ocean Dive

First Time For Everything - Jenn Mathis

I remember my dad's advice as I struggled to learn to ride my first Big Girl Bike sans training wheels: "Keep looking up. If you're always looking down you won't see a thing!" Those early rides on my yellow bike (complete with streamers and a super-cool white basket with plastic flowers) were so freeing. The wind in my hair. That great sensation of independence. The normal barriers didn't apply anymore; I could go places! I closed my eyes and could literally feel the wind in my hair.

Opening my eyes I realize I'm not 5 years old anymore. I'm thirty-something and my super cool yellow-bike-with-streamers-and-a-flowered-basket has been replaced with a set of fins and a regulator. The wind in my hair is real enough - Captain Rod is at the wheel steering his vessel through the Gulf waves to my first ocean water dive as a PADI certified diver. For that matter it's my first swim in the open ocean - ever. And my first dive without my Patriot Scuba dive buddies who have been with me from the start.

"Don't look down Jenn."

Captain Rod's advice as we approach the site, "once you head for the back of the boat just keep moving til you reach the bottom." Whew. Okay... I closed my eyes and took that giant stride leap of faith into the vast ocean, found the anchor line and began my decent. I then woke up to a whole new world.

The silence was so calming and peaceful. Each breath found me more and more relaxed. The warm water wrapped around my wetsuit like a friend's embrace after a long absence. It was all-consuming and instantly tranquil. Grouper, sea urchins, starfish, spiny lobster and spotted scorpionfish - they all moved at their own pace down here. Time was suspended. Weightless. And beautiful.

For 75 glorious minutes that Friday morning, I was fortunate enough to view the world from a different lens. What I didn't realize was how much of the water I would carry back with me.

It's been three days since Jenn's-first-ever-super-cool-big-girl-ocean-dive,

yet the tranquility remains inside of me as if I still wore my wetsuit.

There's this relaxed grin on my face that hasn't left me. Closing my eyes I am instantly transported back to the reefs. I hope the water's embrace will carry with me for a long time to come. In the meantime, I promise to keep looking up.