Changing Lives

A few weeks ago, I was manning Patriot Scuba’s booth at the biannual Occoquan Craft Show.  It’s a big deal for the merchants in this area as it attracts tens of thousands of people from various walks of life though this otherwise quiet town.  It’s the kind of event where most people weave their way through the throngs of tented booths more often than not finding themselves in conversation with one merchant or another until the whole event takes on a social feel.  Our booth gets a lot of this social interaction as even non-divers find themselves wandering in out of curiosity.  That particular day, I greeted a passerby with our usual “Ready to start diving?” but received an unusual reply. 

“I wish,” she said through a sad sort of smile.  She could see the question forming in my eyes and preempted it with a rather sad story beginning with a gruesome car crash and a badly fractured spine and culminating in a bout with cancer that left this survivor with a permanent limp.  Her features were thick with the melancholy of possibilities lost, dreams of diving dying all over again in her eyes.  That’s when I mentioned the HSA (Handicapped Scuba Association).  The loss on her face cleared like so much fog as she took the medical forms from my hand.  The electric sensation of hope returning to once despondent features was palpable.  “Thank you,” she beamed tripping slightly on her words.  “I never thought – I never knew that I could still – Thank you.  Thank you so much.”

It is moments like this that keep me teaching.  Nothing compares to the feeling you get watching it all click with a student.  There are plenty of students that butt up against challenges in dive classes, fear of the water, low confidence or physical limitation.  Some overcome these faster than others but, regardless of what the challenge or how long it takes to overcome, watching that metamorphosis from struggling student to successful diver is awe inspiring.  A student who pushes through their perceived limitations and reaches a level of success they previously thought impossible is forever changed.  That sort of achievement liberates people from the shackles of their own self-imposed limitations and the change is tangible.  Changes like that permeate the lives of those students, giving them the confidence to succeed where once they met only failure.  I've had more than one new diver tell me that open water changed their lives, that they had more confidence at work, at home, in public.  They stand taller, breathe easier, and take on life with an easy smile.  I want to be a part of that change.  I want to help people grow like that. 

Teaching diving allows me to be a part of that experience.  So send me your wide-eyed students, send me your scared and your skittish.  Send me all of your “problem students” and your novice divers.  I’ll take them all just to see the look on their faces when can’t becomes can.  Every smile and look of astonished joy makes all the hard work worth it.  Scuba diving changes lives and that is why I teach.