I really only have my dad to thank for getting me into Scuba. He started diving when I was 14 and from the start pestered me to join him. As the cautious teenager I was, I could think of at least 1,000 reasons I didn't want to scuba dive but the only one that seemed to fend off my dad was a fear of sharks. He could argue any point I made until I said "But dad, sharks". So for over 2 years I watched, I listened and I learned. My dad got more and more obsessed, but after a couple months he gave up on pressuring me. I didn't share with him that I was truly curious and wanted to try it, but it always lingered in my mind.
The certification class I ended up taking was 12 hours of classroom and pool work and an end test of 4 dives in Monterey, CA. My dad was training to be a Dive Master (the highest level of recreational scuba diving without being an instructor) at the time of my class so he was able to be a helper. Having him there through the process as a 16 year old was extremely helpful. I still remember him calming me down as I felt that 55 ° water make its way into my wetsuit and chill my spine. He was always there watching over me whenever I was doing a test like taking off my mask at 30 feet under the water. That weekend of the four certification dives was the most eye opening experience of my life. Seeing fish under the sea, seeing how big seaweed actually is, even just seeing sand 30 feet under water is breathtaking the first time.
So far I have only had time to do 40 dives since I started, but I'm as hooked as can be. Every time I'm descending under the water, I feel as free as a bird. The flying feeling when you're completely buoyant in the water is probably the closest you can get besides skydiving. Some of the coolest things I've seen include 20 seals swimming all around me, an eel poking his head out of a hole as I looked in, and a sea otter pup playing with his mother only 10 feet away from me. I have only dived in Monterey, Catalina, San Diego, and Lake Tahoe but I look forward to experiencing this adventure for the rest of my life and seeing how many places I can go and how many dives I can rack up.
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