ROAR!!

“When I'm scared, I breathe like this.” My daughter took three huge gasps and I'm pretty sure she almost split the seams of her wetsuit.

“Remember, if you are scared, take deep breaths. We're not in any rush and we're going to take it very slow.”

We were walking along the beach to the stairs in front of the artificial reef and it was a little after 8 PM. Since we were so far east, it was already dark. We were going on her first night snorkel.

“I'm just a little scared,” she confided and took three more huge gasps.

“Are you sure you want to go? We can go tomorrow night.”

Since her brother had gone the night before and told her about all the cool things he'd seen, I knew there was no chance she was going to let me off the hook tonight.

“I'll be ok, daddy.”

We'd snorkeled the artificial reef earlier in the day so she was familiar the the area. It was only a short swim of about 100 yards.

We sat on the steps and had a pre-dive briefing.

“We're going to sit on the steps and put the masks on.”

A quick nod.

“Then put on our fins.”

Another nod.

“Then we'll turn on the lights. When you're ready, we'll just lean forward and kick out. We're going to go nice and slow. I'll hold your hand the whole time. If you get scared, you can climb on my back and rest. Then we'll keep going. If you get scared, we can always come back in.” This got me a quick kiss on my cheek. (I used this same lecture for my son, father-in-law, brother-in-law and sister-in-law, except none of them gave me a kiss. I don't think they were really listening.)

Halfway out, I felt a hand on my back and a quick scramble next to me. “Daddy!” My daughter, using her normal perfect timing had waited until I'd breathed out before her scramble. Before I could get a breath I was under water while my daughter was comfortably sitting on my back.

“I lost my fin!” I heard as I came up for air. Tears were streaming down her face under her mask. We took a few moments to calm down, then I looked under the water while she held on to my back. That's when I realized the meaning of futility. At night, underwater is the definition of black. The dive light makes a nice bright beam, but that beam is not wide. The futility was looking for a dark blue fin in black water with a sobbing seven-year old riding on your back as waves bounce you up and down.

“It's ok. We'll get you more fins tomorrow.”

“Fin,” several words that could not be translated from snorkeleze. “Lost!”

A few minutes of treading water (I was treading, she was graciously letting me hold her above the waves.) and she decided she was ready to continue. (Sound is strange when you're in the water. High pitched sounds carry farther and seem amplified. I know this because, “Fin” and “Lost” along with soft sobs accompanied us the rest of the way to the artificial reef.

As we came over the tires and she saw her first lion fish, her lack of one fin vanished. She did her normal kick, twist and sideways spin. (My daughter took to water almost as soon as she was born. She has a unique way of moving through the water. All four limbs move at the same time (But none of them seem to know what the other is doing, or care for that matter). This causes a corkscrew motion through the water that is remarkable effective. Think of an octopus that suddenly realizes that it has twice as many legs as it should and hasn't quite figured out why or what to do with the extra limbs.) “ROAR!” she yelled as she looked down. (The lion fish was 10 feet below us. Both it and my daughter were safe from each other.) a couple of feet further and she saw her first octopus. (Just like the lion fish, the octopus had it's own sound. For the life of me, I have no idea what it was, I just know it was loud.)

Two lion fish, two octopi, several lobsters and a dozen string rays later, I had the pattern down and was able to gasp a deep breath before she climbed on my back. She lifted her head and said she'd seen all that her brother had and was ready to go in.

“Awesome!” was the first unsnorkeled word she said as we sat on the steps.

“Did you see the lion fish?”

“ROAR!”

"Did you see the octopus turn red?”

“Was he mad cause cause you touched him?” (I'd dove down to see if he would swim away. (I'm guessing it was a he because it wasn't smart enough to hide when two huge aliens swam over it. And since my daughter was still roaring to call the other lion fish, we definitely did not sneak up on it.)

“Yes. Did you have fun?”

I got a salty kiss on my cheek. “Yes, daddy.”

That more than made up for each mouthful of seawater I swallowed each time she climbed up on my back.