Descent | The Beachside Resident

Descent

By: Matt Badolato

Article Category: Matt Badolato Leave a Comment

All week I spend studying for this, working on that. Car horns are honking and the TV news keeps babbling. Just as my skin is about dried up from city life, my buddy and I plan a dive trip. The next morning I find myself sitting on a big Igloo cooler slid up against the transom of a twenty-foot catamaran.

As we pounce over the smooth, sun-glazed swells, the bow of the boat sneezes up a mist of water that blows back and cools my face. My mind stays quiet except for the dub-reggae baseline still stuck in my head from the car ride to the boat ramp. Behind me, the four-stroke Suzukis purr like content robotic lions proud to be carrying us out to sea. I try to shut my eyes, but I can’t help staying awake to enjoy a journey that’s as good as the destination.\

The boat comes off plane and everyone on board shifts their attention from la-la land to the fish finder. The rasta-colored, psychedelic spikes on the screen trigger a response in our brains and fire up smiles on all of our faces.

Getting ready for the dive is a blur of colors and sounds — black neoprene wetsuits, fluorescent yellow masks, teak spearguns, the heavy clunk of weight belts and the hissing of air as valves are turned.

Ten minutes later, a bass drum slaps the inside of my temples as I equalize my ears underwater. I swim down through clear teal water following the white cord from the marker buoy that leads the way to the bottom. It disappears into the abyss like a lane-line on a foggy road. Twenty feet below me, my friend disappears into a dark cloud — an apparition vanishing through a wall.

As I venture deeper, I’m engulfed in a cold, brown pulp. Thermocline. Whale snot. The layer of frigid water is the color of cardboard and I can hardly see my hand in front of my face. The hissing sound of my breath through my regulator reminds me of Darth Vader and only adds to the eeriness.

I keep swimming down, my pole spear held out in front of me in case I should hit the silted up bottom. To my surprise and delight, the snotty water dissipates and a clear view of the bottom opens up. Silhouettes of large fish move slowly across the bottom below me. It’s dark down here, almost like dusk, the gnarled rocks and gothic ledges illuminated by a distant setting sun. The dense thermocline shades this fertile garden on the sea floor.

I begin my exploration of this alien planet. Suspended above the grey, sandy bottom, a school of baby Spanish sardines scatters the light with the mirrors on the sides of their bodies. They all move in unison, their bodies always facing the same direction, as if they were a single organism. Directly below the piddling baitfish lies a large flounder, hardly noticeable with the dim lighting. Its eyes are the only thing giving away its presence, for its skin exactly matches the surrounding gravel and muddy sand. Wide-eyed and gazing at the buffet above, it waits eagerly for a shiny member of the school to drop into its attack zone.

At this point, the nature-observing and scientific Rachel Carson/Jacques Cousteau in me is smoothly transformed into a hunter with a carnivorous appetite and a desire to feed. This is a standard metamorphosis that comes with carrying a spear into a giant aquarium of delicacies. As if on instinct, I load the elastic band onto my wrist and my heart quickens as I take aim, release the spear, and hit the unsuspecting flounder right behind the gills. The fish shudders in shock and turns a ghastly white color, fanning sand out from underneath it like a carpet being shaken of its dust. Green blood leaks out of the puncture wound left by the spear.

I bag the fish and continue on my investigation of the reef. I swim along a ledge large enough to stand under. I can hear the Rice Krispie-crackling sounds made by millions of organisms with names that most likely end in “-pod.” Lobsters, standing tall as 3-year-olds, casually scurry backward into their stony dens. A giant sheepshead cruises along the edge of the reef with its pectoral fins fully extended, a broad-shouldered bouncer making rounds at a club. I catch a sleeping nurse shark off guard, and the large, frightened animal sends a strong pulse through the water as it shoots itself away from the coral-encrusted ledge.

I reach to my side and find, by feel, my pressure gauge. My air is running low with enough for a safe ascent. Time to go. I kick slowly toward the surface, drifting upward like an astronaut on the moon. Swimming at the speed of my bubbles, I look toward my feet and watch the bottom disappear through the dense haze below me.

About forty feet below the surface, the water clears up again and I find myself squinting under the bright sun. I check my depth gauge and level off at fifteen feet. Here, the water feels hot compared to the cold bottom. It feels like a hot tub. I allow my body to decompress and pass the time by watching the iridescent comb jellyfish dance around me. I gaze upward at the ripples on the water’s surface. There’s nothing like staring up at the border between two worlds.