musing in the rain

Chatelaine finds herself swimming in the rain and wondering what it's like to swim under the water in the rain.

When I was learning to scuba dive in Camiguin, Mindanao, Philippines, it rained on one of the days we were to go diving. I wondered while eating breakfast if that would be a problem for scuba diving.

My teacher, a German-Bavarian man, said rainy days are the best days to scuba, because 1) you're already wet (or as he said it "yurr alveddy vet") and 2) you can enjoy being vet...um wet. He was right. Although, the rain and wind can wreck havoc on the boat that takes you there. The waves were fairly choppy, but once under the water, the wind, the breaks of waves had no meaning.

These tiny drops of water that seem so bothersome above land are merely drops to the vast ocean easily swallowed. It's a bit harder to see underwater when it's raining simply because there isn't as much sunlight to penetrate below, so the distances one can see are quite shortened. Underwater, I had forgotten the gloomy weather, the brown outs, the chill of air on water. The deeper we went, the smaller the outline of our bouncing boat anchored with one line to keep from smashing upon the rocks.

The scuba gear that had burdened my steps in air, barely registered on my muscles. It's like flying. Like the sea turtle we saw swimming away from us. Manong Pawikan didn't seem to even notice that the surface rippled from the wind and waves.