I messaged an old friend and dive buddy, Dave, today, when
he posted on line some pictures of a family fishing trip to Mexico. I have not
seen him for a number of years, keeping in touch as many people do via Facebook
and the annual exchange of Christmas cards.
I related that my next dive trip would be to Hawaii with my teenage
nephew. He mentioned that his teenage
son, Cole, wanted to learn to scuba dive for some time, but they just never
found the time. Hopefully, that would be
rectified this summer. My two nephews had
similar experiences with a long elapsed time between the discovery of the
desire to learn to dive and the completion of openwater certification. Dave wondered if we might all meetup soon to
do some diving around Santa Barbara.
Dave was certified in 1985.
I helped teach the class as an assistant instructor and divemaster. We did our dives at Arroyo Burro Beach and at
Anacapa Island on the M/V Sea Venture. The following year, Dave quickly
completed his rescue diver and assistant instructor certification. A dive club trip to Catalina Island on Derby
Day preceded a summer spent together on various diveboats from Ventura-area
marinas to the Channel Islands. I worked
the deck as divemaster paired with Dave as the rescue swimmer. We rotated with another divemaster-rescue
swimmer team, working alternating dives.
On three- and four-dive days, each team managed two or three dives. We harvested and cooked a fair number of
bacon-wrapped rock scallops that summer on my Weber Smoking Joe grill. A year later,
Dave spent the following summer as a dive
instructor at a Club Med village in Mexico.
When I visited him, I taught as a short-term replacement for an injured
instructor.
I am hoping that lightning will strike the same place twice,
albeit three decades apart, and we can show the younglings some of the places
that we visited when we were young and divers.
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