Ladies and gentlemen of the class of '99:
Breathe!
If I could offer you only one tip for
the future, breathing would be it. The long-term benefits of breathing
under extreme changes in pressure has been proven by millions of people
whose lungs do not have hideous, gaping holes in them, whereas the rest of
my advice has no basis more reliable than my own tragic, yet amusing,
experience.
I will dispense this advice now.
Enjoy
the convenience and elasticity of your fin straps. No, never mind. You
will not understand the convenience and elasticity convenience of your fin
straps until they've broken. But trust me, in 20 years, you'll think back
of all the dives you've missed because of broken fin straps and recall in
a way you can't grasp now, how much of a moron you must be to have
forgotten an extra fin strap
.
AGAIN.
You are not as
negatively buoyant as you imagine.
Don't worry about being eaten
by the local fauna. Or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as
expecting your dive buddy to calculate the correct NDL for your dive. The
real troubles during your dive are apt to be things that never crossed
your nitrogen soaked mind - The kind that will keep you in a decompression
chamber until 4:00 PM, next Tuesday.
Stuff everything you see
into your BC pockets during every dive.
Equalize.
Don't
close the valve on your dive buddy's tank No matter how funny it
may be. Don't put up with dive buddies who will turn off yours.
Purge.
Don't waste your time on perfect buoyancy. Sometimes your dive
slate will sink you like an anchor; sometimes you cant submerge
without the aid of a 55 gallon drum full of lead shot. There are 5
gazillion variables, and you will bleed from your ears if you think about
it too much.
Remember to keep some slack in your float line.
Don't get tangled in it. If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.
Keep
your old dive logs. Throw away your raunchy old mouthpieces.
Streamline.
Don't feel bad if you havent quite mastered the compass.
The most interesting dives I have been on were led by divemasters who didnt
know how to use one. The most interesting divemasters I know often mistake
it for their watch.
Get plenty of Dramamine Keep it in
your dive bag.
Be gentle with your mask strap. You'll miss it
when it breaks.
Maybe you'll find a sane, human-type dive buddy
- maybe you won't.
Maybe hell have a Death Star Class spear gun
as well, maybe you won't.
Maybe you'll need to design a spear-proof
vest; maybe you'll require a prosthetic torso.
Whatever you do, don't
pity yourself too much, or weep bitterly for yourself either. Your dive
buddy is probably insane. So is everybody else's.
Spit in your
mask. Do it as often as possible. Don't be afraid of it or of what other
people think of it. Spit is the best de-fogger you'll ever own.
Use
the standard hand-signals, even if you dont quite remember *exactly*
what they meant (If your dive buddy doesnt understand, simply
exaggerate the gesture until he/she does).
Shit-can any
directions you receive with SCUBA gear - Who the hell needs directions on
How to use a snorkel anyway!?! (Besides your dive buddy)
Do
not look at the picture on your Certification card - It will only make you
feel ugly.
Do not get too attached to your weights or the stuff
you clip to your BC. You never know when they'll be gone for good.
Understand
that dive boat captains come and go, but always tip them generously. Slip
them at least a 5 or a 10, because when you surface, youd like to
see the dive boat waiting for you, not back at the dock next to the Tiki
Bar.
Float on the surface, but submerge before you drift to
Cuba. Play underwater, but surface before your joints start to tingle.
Off-gas.
Accept certain inalienable truths:
Your power inflator will stick. You'll get sand in your second stage. You,
too, will pee in a rental wetsuit. And when this happens, you'll fantasize
that when you were a newbie, power inflators never got stuck, you never
inhaled sand, and nobody ever peed in the rental wetsuit you are currently
wearing.
Pee in your wetsuit.
Don't expect
anyone else to watch your SPG. Maybe you have a 120 cu. Ft. tank, maybe
you have a pony bottle. But you never know when either one might run out.
Don't mess too much with your power inflator or by the time
you're 4 minutes into the dive you will have 300psi.
Be careful
whose gear you buy, but be patient with those who let you borrow it.
Buying used gear is a form of mental illness. Selling it is a way of
fishing your wetsuit from the dive bag (Where it has been for the past 5
weeks - after you put it away wet...), rinsing it off, chiseling off the
reeking moldy parts and stiffing some poor shmuck for more than it's
worth.
But trust me on the breathing....