65% Fun, 35% Terrifying

I went snorkling today.

Those of you who don't understand the significance of that don't understand my pathological fear of deep/open water. I really can't explain it, I yawn through airplane turbulance, traverse steep scree slopes without a care, but get me out of sight of land or in sight of coral reefs, I freak the shit out. I am basically the world's biggest landlubber, even if I'm in a plane, if I can't see land I start panicing and thinking we're going to drown at sea. When I fly overseas I leave my window shut. Along with never going on a cruise, that seems to solve the problem.

Coral Reefs are another thing. They're full of things that I can't see that can bite and/or sting me. Cliffs? Whatever, I can control whether or not I fall. Put me in a place where I just have to hope unknown things don't attack me? Yeah, to say I get nervous is an understatement. My fear of reefs stems back to an unfortunate trigger fish/panic attack incident in Hawaii in 7th grade. I haven't snorkled since, until today.

As the post title indicates, I mostly enjoyed it. When I was able to borrow goggles I wasn't too afraid because I could see everything and make sure nothing was attacking me. I even dove deep and swam in 5 foot wide cracks about 10 feet down to get a better immersion experience. I saw all the corals I've seen in aquariums my entire life, along with cuttlefish, a seasnake, an eel, tons of fish, crabs, and underwater hot springs. It was really really cool.

Unfortunately, when I had to give up the goggles, I knew all those things were there, but couldn't see them. I could only assume they would immediately try to attack me. This led to some freaking out as I was afraid to put my feet down on any rocks and am not a good enough swimmer to tread water endlessly. Minor panic attack insued before I sucked it up, opened my eyes underwater and endured the salt sting long enough to scout out a good landing zone. This process would be repeated everytime a wave knocked me off my perch, and everytime I was able to obtain and subsequently had to give back goggles.

All in all, it was a cool experience and I'm looking forward to next time when I have the foresight to obtain goggles of my own.