I Went Diving

My friend Kevin called me last night and invited me to go diving with him and his wife, Deb, today. So I did. I went straight downstairs after I hung up and packed my dive gear, then I wrote myself a note to fix me up a weight belt in the morning since I'd lost one of my weight pockets last weekend. After a stop at the dive shop to pick up a pocket belt to put my soft weights into, I got to their house, loaded my gear and tanks into their SUV and off we went. We first dived at Gill's Rock on the very tippy end of Door County where there's an old Rambler at about 45' that rolled off the car ferry one day more than a few years ago. It's pretty destroyed by now, the rocks from the breakwater are crushing it, and the water and zebra mussels are taking their toll. Water temp was 72 until we got deeper than 50' when the temp dropped to about 45. Brrr. We didn't stay that deep for long. We saw a few smallmouth bass and a dishwasher that has nearly rotted away on the bottom. It's amazing the things you see when you're diving. We saw 2 aluminum lounge chairs down there and one folded lawn chair that's nearly totally buried. I saw some metal contraption that looked kind of like a typewriter but isn't. We dived for nearly an hour, changed out our used tanks for fresh, and drove five miles toward home to Garrett Bay outside of Ellison Bay for our second dive. There's a lovely shipwreck in Garrett Bay that we've visited a zillion times since we got certified in 1990. Today the water was pretty clear--about 25-30' of visibility--and 73 degrees from the surface to our maximum depth of 22'. We spent an hour visiting all the pieces of the wreck of the Fleetwing and were followed by a nice-sized school of smallmouth bass. We also so a pair of suckers looking all shiny and silvery. It was a lovely dive. After we got all our gear off and mostly packed we sat on a sunny rock and (finally!) ate our Subway lunches while we watched the water and some kayakers. It was a fun day with great weather and good friends. Durwood and I microzapped some leftover chicken and mushrooms, shared an orange, and I have to say I'm about ready to conk out. It's tiring hauling all that heavy, wet gear around. I'll sleep good tonight.

August 19--Louis Comfort Tiffany, Bowl. Gisela always loved the bowl that sat on Aunt Sadie's table. It was round and lumpy with grapes and leaves. When she sat at the table eating her breakfast she liked watching the morning light make the colors change. Sometimes it looked gold and sometimes green. When it was rainy the little bowl glowed like it had a light bulb in it. She always picked a flower, a handful of dandelions or Queen Anne's Lace for Aunt Sadie to put in there. Mama said that Aunt Sadie shouldn't put water in it, that the bowl was too valuable, but Sadie just winked at Gisela and arranged the flowers.

And now, precious friends, I'm going to go to bed. I'm pooped.
--Barbara