Adventure

("Postcards from Nowhere")

I hadn't seen Vladi over the summer.  While I was working, he was going to summer school taking classes all day in order to graduate a year early.  His girlfriend graduated with me, so he couldn't stand the thought of being a high school senior while she went to college.  Junior College, that is, for in the fall, that is where we were all going.  I knew many people who would be going there.  It seemed as if I was not the only one who had not made plans.  

I had made a lot of money over the summer and had spent none of it, so I decided to relieve myself of its burden by buying some scuba gear.  Vladi, of course, was ready, too, and one afternoon we went to the hero's Dive Shop ready to be heros, too.  The Man Himself was there, and he took a casual interest in us as we shopped for masks and fins, wet suits, scuba tanks, weight belts, and regulators.  And, of course, a handy-dandy, heavy duty dive bag to dump it all into.  When we were finally all tooled up, Hal came over to ask us where we were going to dive first.  We didn't know.  

"We've got a night dive going this weekend if you want to sign up.  You haven't had a night dive yet, have you?  Well, this is a great opportunity.  Hank over there is going with us and will take care of you."  

Hank had been the dive instructor for our course.  Hank was a nice guy, tall and Nordic looking, and he had a slight limp from a bought with the bends he had on a deep dive that left his left leg partially paralyzed.  But he got around alright and was fine in the water.  Vladi and I looked at each other.  We were eager to go.  

The dive was on a Saturday.  It was a long drive north to the place we would be diving, a deep hole in the bottom of a lake that tied into a large series of underwater limestone caves forming the aquifer.  We showed up at the shop as the sun was hanging low in the sky and put our stuff on the old Bluebird bus with everybody else.  There were about ten of us going.  

Tommy and I got stuck in the back, of course, being young and stupid, feeling the swaying of the bus and smelling the rich, inevitable gas fumes from the old bus's faulty exhaust.  The windows were down and the engine was loud making it difficult to talk.  Vladi and I sat silent listening to the metal clanking of the clutch as Hank made his way through the gears.  

It was a long drive, nearly two hours, until we stopped at a gate on a country road.  We were all glad to get off the bus.  

Hal was working the lock and the gate and talking.  "The fellow who owns this property only lets us dive here.  He won't give permission to anybody else.  We're going to go down this path here.  It's an old Confederate corduroy road made with cut logs.  See here?  You can see how they laid them parallel like this.  The road is all torn up, so I want everyone to walk from here.  We'll follow the bus about a mile down to the lake."  

Hal got the gate open and Hank pulled the bus on through.  Everyone began to chatter.  I looked at Vladi.  Man, I thought.  This is an adventure just like the things I had seen on TV.  His eyes let me know he was thinking the same thing.  

Some of the divers had grabbed their dive lights and shone them on the path as we walked behind the bus.  We had to stop and wait often as the bus bumped and rocked over the heavily rutted path which was no longer a road or even a path as far as I could tell, the woods around us trying hard to repossess it.  Hal walked in front directing Hank to steer this way and that.   The high revving of the engine and the clanking of the gears cut through the black and silent night.  

Finally the bus pulled to a stop.  

"We're here!" exclaimed Hal.  "Everybody suit up."  

We were standing at the edge of a small, weedy lake.  It looked like nothing more than a pond, really.  We watched as a water snake glided away through the floating weeds. I began to pull my gear out of my big bag, first struggling into my brand new wet suit, yanking and tugging the neoprene over my skin with great effort.  I helped Vladi into his tank and then he helped me, and we snapped on our weight belts and walked to the pond's edge with our flippers and masks and rented diving lights in hand.  Hal was already talking.  

"We're going to swim out to the middle of the lake here.  It is shallow until you get out about thirty yards, then it drops to about thirty feet.  There at the bottom is the opening to the cave.  Hank and I are going to set up ropes right at the entrance.  As soon as you get there, I want you grab onto the rope.  You have to stay with the rope."  

The rope was our lifeline, the way down and the way back.  Divers had been lost in caves and died because of rope failures.  About the rope, we were serious.  

"Wait here while Hank and I get it all set up."  

And with that, they slipped underwater and were gone.  We all stood in waist deep watching the glow of their lights slowly fade, following the line of their air bubbles.  I stood looking into the clear night sky, looking at the million stars and listening to the chirr of insects all around us.  We seemed to stand there forever.  

We saw the lights and bubbles as they returned.  Hal stood up and began to give instructions. Make sure to stay with your diving partner, he said.  We all knew that.  Vladi and I were ready.  

As we sank under water, we could barely see.  The bottom had been churned up by the divers in front of us, so all we could do was follow them blindly, keeping an eye on their lights.  The bottom gently dropped, then more steeply, and then we were there.  Vladi and I looked at one another, shining our lights into each other's eyes.  We quickly learned that was no good.  I could see the question marks on his face.  They were the same as mine.  "Blooolooloooloop.  Shhhhhh.   Bloooolooloooloop."  The only sound was that of the regulator releasing air into our lungs and then back out into the lake.  Then suddenly, it was our turn.  Hal motioned to Vladi to enter the cave.  And quickly, he motioned to me.  I grabbed onto the line and looked at Hal who gave me the thumbs up.  I wanted to ask some last minute questions, wanted some last words of advice.  I gave him the thumbs up instead and was gone.  

Hal had told us that the bottom of the cave was some two hundred feet below, but we would not be going that deep.  They had rigged the lines so that we would go only part way.  Hank was sitting on the other end of the line.  I followed Vladi's fins as we dropped into the black water.  All I could see was a small circle of light that shined from my rented light.  And suddenly, it went out.  I was in darkness and felt the adrenaline flowing inside me.  Quickly, I banged the light on my leg and it came back on.  Then off.  Then on.  Vladi came back up the line to see what I was doing.  I pointed to my light and shrugged.  He looked at me and shook his head.  I had no idea if he knew what I was trying to tell him.  He gave me the thumbs up sign, and I looked at him uncertainly.  Finally, not knowing what else to do, I gave him the thumbs up back.  We needed more signals, I thought, than thumbs up or thumbs down.  But once again, we resumed our descent slowly down the line.  Drifting, drifting through the darkness, looking at the small bits of greenish algae floating about us, listening to the alternating sound of my regulator, I was floating in space, floating in nothingness.  It was odd and exhilarating.  

After awhile, we ran into some other divers who had gone to the bottom and were heading back up.  We had to maneuver to let them by.  I let go of the rope to let them pass.  So did Tommy.  And in a minute, they were gone.  Then I reached for the rope, but it wasn't there.  I shined my light around but couldn't find it.  I looked at Tommy.  He didn't have it, either.  Suddenly, we were suspended in the darkness un-tethered in an underwater cave.  I hadn't thought about it before, but now it was clear.  The rope was being pulled in all directions by the hands that were holding it, the ones above and the ones below, and when we let go, it had responded to the tension of its anchor points.  It was gone.  I remembered what we had learned in diving school.  Whatever happens, don't panic.  Panic makes you breathe harder and then you use up the air in your tank too fast.  You will need it.  And while remembering that, I heard the sound of my regulator speeding up.  "Blooolooolooolooloolooloop.  Shhhhhh.  Bloooloolooloolooloop."  How in the hell do you keep yourself from panicking, I wondered.  They hadn't told us that.  

Now Vladi was right next to me shining his light in my face, as I was his.  Neither of us could see a thing.  I didn't know what we would do.  It could be disastrous to just head off in a direction hoping to find something, but it could be just as bad to stay where we were, too.  We weren't finding the rope by staying there.  My light was now blinking on and off.  I was just recognizing the crazy rhythm my heart was beating when we saw a light just a little way off.  It was another pair of divers on the rope.  Quickly, Vladi and I swam to it and latched on.   We looked at one another.  Vladi shook his hand back and forth, his eyes showing wide.  I nodded agreement.  

Back on the shore, Vladi and I huddled together talking in low voices.  

"Why in the fuck did you let go of the rope?" I asked.  

"Me!  What the fuck were you doing?"  

"Shit, man, I thought we were done for.  I couldn't see anything.  You kept shining your light in my eyes."  

We were both worn out with it.  We sank back on the ground and listened to the other divers hooting and hollering and telling tales of what they did and saw.  Vladi and I didn't say anything. This wasn't something you wanted to tell.  Hal was walking around checking on everyone.  

"Well, how'd you like that?" he asked us.  

"Oh, man, that was great," Vladi told him.  

"You guys liked it, huh?  This is your first night dive, right?"

"Right," I said.  "It was our first time in a cave, too."  

"Well, this is a big night for you boys.  A big night."  

Back on the bus, Vladi and I sat staring out the window into the passing night.  Worn out, we struggled to stay awake.  For a moment, I thought about what could have happened if we had not seen the lights.  I thought about my mother and my father.  But it hadn't happened, and here I was.  Yes, I thought, it had been an adventure.