What I have learned

    What have I learned? What have I learned?


    We come to this life in the sea with childhood myths of creatures that will harm us and currents that can sweep us away.
    Then... with the first taste of salt and a fin stroke we are seduced.


    I have learned I am hopelessly addicted to this mistress mother ocean. I have lied to my family to be with her with out guilt or remorse. I will go alone in the cold of night to meet her. I lie to myself she can be lived with.....if I'm strong, healthy, deeply experienced, and lucky. I lie that the lessons learned from the 23 friends I lost over the many years will teach me to survive.


    The passing of our brother Rick Hadley shows this myth not to be true. No amount of training and experience will keep us safe from a rocky shoreline with seas and a death trap beneath her dark waters.


    I shall continue my love affair with her..... but pray I have a crew like Lyle, Robert, Jeff and Steve to bring me home someday. I love you guys and will always keep Rick's angel on my shoulder to whisper to me. Bless you.


    Don

    "Great mother ocean brought forth all life, it is my eternal home'' Don Berry from Blue Water Hunters.


    Spearfishing Store the freediving and spearfishing equipment specialists.

    It is a strange love affair.


    I used to lie in my bed when I lived on Kauai and was really getting into surfing. The surf report called for 6-8 (Hawaiian) and I'd wake up at 3 am and could hear the waves crashing down the valley from where I lived in Kilauea. Waiting for sunrise, wondering if I was going to take off on the biggest wave of my life that day....and what would happen.


    It's the same spearfishing....and I'm 58 !! We're planning on going to the atholl. 25 miles one way. We know there are going to be BIG snappers....60 lbs and more.....and I lay there at 3 am, wondering if the weather will hold....thinking of dropping to 60....70 feet....and knowing that seeing a big cubera will make me stay a bit longer....and what could happen then.


    It is strange. Is it a love? An addiction? Every trip I pray that God will get me home safe to my little boy.


    We are a strange breed. What else could make us go back again....as you said Don, having lost friends, which thank God hasn't happened to me yet. A true band of brothers....crazy brothers. :)

    All true - I grew up on/under the ocean spent all of my time from age 8 or so on the ocean and under it from age 11 until I went into the service, Navy of course, 4 years bouncing around on a Tin Can then back to Panama and my ocean. The Panama Canal treaty with the U.S. ended all that in late 1978 and I have since moved from place to place but every now and again the call beckons me back to the blue. It's in our DNA and those that aren't afflicted don't understand.


    I got an email about Rick, and even if I didn't know him personally I still felt like I knew him because of what his passion was. How an highly experienced and accomplished diver can lose his life is a reminder of the thin line we sometimes approach in our love of the ocean.


    I have come very very close to dying in the ocean myself - one of those times was nothing short of a miracle of me surviving. Simple truth is we Freediver's and spearo's dive alone even when diving with buddies. It s the nature of our sport and we assume the risks and mitigate them on our own terms.


    Old age and lack of capabilities that I once had is now my safety net.


    We will always be drawn to the ocean, most here are fortunate to live close to an ocean or sea - some of us are left wanting but the DNA is the same and we stop and reflect when one of us is taken - but it doesn't deter us from yearning to return to the ocean.


    Sorry my single malt isle of Islay 16 year old Lagavulin scotch put me in an introspective mood.


    RIP Rick and hope the family is able to cope with their loss.

    Great stuff guys. Safe diving is always the name of the game but there is something to be said about being out alone in the ocean exploring with just you and your thoughts below the surface. It's a hard addiction to break and I wouldn't want too anyway even if I could. I love everything about the water and all the stuff that goes in and around it. It fascinates me. I remember SCUBA diving for the first time and feeling like I was some sort of astronaut exploring some far away world with no gravity. And now exploring that world on a single breath of air makes it feel more real, more tangible. Freediving feels like you're a part of that underwater world rather than the feeling that you're just visiting as I often feel when SCUBA diving.


    Sorry for your loss Don. Thankfully, I've haven't lost any friends to this sport yet and hopefully I never have too. I'm glad to share these experiences with my brothers here on Speardiver. So that we may all live vicariously through one another and learn from one another. :toast:

    I'm a relatively young diver and unfortunately know this feeling all too well already Don. The ocean is an unforgiving place and it is a thin line between life and death when submerged below its surface.


    I think we all grow out of the initial feelings of doing battle with the ocean when we start our spearfishing journey and start to feel embraced in its cool, clear waters. Our sport both demands and provides a feeling of calm and relaxation until the point where we almost forget the inherent dangers of what we are doing.


    Looking at the jocks playing football or guys riding motocross, this doesn't feel like an extreme sport. But I don't know anyone who has died playing football, and have only one friend who was seriously injured riding motocross. I have lost 3 people to freediving who I've known well, another to a shark attack, and have heard far too many stories of friends of friends drowning.


    Everything you've said rings true for me Don. I'm terribly sorry for your loss.

    I have not suffered the pain his best friend Lyle has or his training partner Carla Hanson.I shift my mindset like a coward when I drift to the thoughts of Rick's kids and family. I am very lucky to have the Neptunes as my extended family along with my wife and boy. My new wife Mandy will never understand why we do what we do,
    she is not a ocean person but a soul mate non the less.


    My friends are going back to the cave to rewind Ricks last time there and try to learn more about that horrible night, then tell the story so we will know and remember. I have done this with a few friends I have lost.


    Sorry to ramble guys, thanks for your reflections on the sea.


    Don

    "Great mother ocean brought forth all life, it is my eternal home'' Don Berry from Blue Water Hunters.


    Spearfishing Store the freediving and spearfishing equipment specialists.

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