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December 10th, 2012
I always found pleasure in my underwater paradise. To swim beneath the surface of the sea and play among the life inside her wet wonderland has always gratified my need to relieve my stress from a long, hectic day. The beauty of the ocean is as majestic as the sun that casts a glare of light off her vast canvas. Life down here is beautiful and can be considered, in its own right, Nirvana.
The sea creatures are equally beautiful in the surrounding water, encompassing them like a cocoon. Finding such beauty under the blanket of blue liquid is not rare. But if you heed the old saying, "stop and smell the roses," occasionally, you can marvel at how beautiful Mother Nature can create these sea life animals. Every part of their anatomy somehow flows with the basic needs of a species to survive here. Nature has intricately placed the survival needs right where they belong to survive in their environment.
If you don't believe me, you'll just have to come under the sea to see heaven for yourself.
The live coral builds itself up from the seabed's sandy foundation, like the Rocky Mountains that rise from the ground of the western United States up towards the earth's hemisphere. But unlike those mountains of grey and brown rock, these corals are colorful like a rainbow. The rock-like formation grows and forms into its odd shapes as the edges of the reef reach up towards the glaring ultraviolet rays produced from up above by the burst of sunshine sent down to them from the sun, as the light penetrates the ocean deep blue surroundings like sharp daggers and touching the corals rough surface as it fuels their growth.
The rocks form caverns so all sea forms can find safety and shelter from predators. Or so they call, lie in wait for their prayer. But life perseveres. Life here goes on.
But I am far from their predator. I love to play on these rocks. My scuba gear allows me to swim in their watery playground beyond my lung capacity. I may watch the colorful fish play a peek-a-boo game with me because they fear my significant presence. When actually, I'm in their way, and I just really want to watch them play.
The only fish I can't see are the ones that Mother Nature blessed with such color to coordinate with the coral's vibrant color, where they can hide before my eyes. Like life, seeing is believing, and if you can't see them, are they there?
Their camouflage protects them from creatures that want to eat them. It's such a cruel world, in this water world of paradise, much like the land mass I come from, where a predator can change things instantly. But despite a possible death, the fish continue to do what they do because life goes on.
Funny, I can find such beauty in their harsh environment, knowing that one of these fish that brings me such joy can meet a horrible end at any time. Yet, I use their beauty to escape the atrocities of my own world just a few feet above. In this waterland, it is beauty and the beast. And up there, where I'm from, in another unforgiving world, life is truly a dog eat, dog world.
No matter where I am in my travels or how hard I try to lose myself in my scuba gear, I cannot hide from my fate or the past. It doesn't matter how deep I dive into this sea or the ocean's darkness because the problems I have been trying to avoid are waiting for me at the surface.
I decided to try and maintain a depth that a snorkel would allow me to see life from above and hope that the clear blue water would show me the bigger picture of life with HD clarity and leave the tanks of air on the boat and forget diving into the past.
I figure I can stay in the shallow end of the lagoon and forget about the dangers of the ocean because the less depth I have to deal with, the better. Hopefully, this area will allow me some sort of balance in my life with greater control than this shallow area.
Life can take over you and control how you function, like a current's undertone pulling you in the direction it wants you to flow. It will dictate how you're supposed to feel if you allow it to draw you in that direction. And it's so unfair when you feel like shit all the time because of the events that unfolded in your life. Those events are out of your control. Like the vast ocean, it's hard to find cover from the evil that lurks out there in the beds of the coral reefs. Although I avoid life's confrontations utilizing whatever camouflage that's available, at times, it's not enough.
Life is too short for bullshit.
The good thing is that I am a strong swimmer, and life still seems to be finding me. Even though it wreaks havoc on me mentally and physically, like the surf that pounds a coastline and erodes the sandy beaches, I push on towards the horizon and, hopefully, the good things waiting for me.
But I swim, damn it. I swim in my sliver of the ocean carved out just for me through life's lessons, time, and age. I try to avoid the bad by leaving the worst moments behind me in my wake. But leaving things behind can be daunting, and I find myself where I left off because I allow it to drag me back to sea. The thought of playing in the coral reefs is just a dream that I try to relive repeatedly, but still, it's just a dream.
You have to swim to survive. You have to swim to succeed. You have to swim to your dreams or risk being left behind. Ride the wave of life and leave the ocean's depths for the fish. Life up above is waiting.
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