November Captain's Chronicles

Dry Gills / Seeing Red / Thanksgetting

Are your gills dry fellow divers?  Mine are brittle and desperately in need of a submersion in seawater! We are approaching two months without running a boat trip on the Psychquatic. The longest dry spell in almost 25 years for Scuba Marco. Ian was absolutely brutal to our water quality and clarity. Nicole’s little exclamation point didn’t help either. Can’t complain, we were ultimately very fortunate. Healing takes time! Patience is part of our motto… along with kindness, it’s always free. So let’s maintain our sanity (or semblance thereof) until that next submersion! Hang in there gills… good dives come to those who wait!

Marco Island is evidently just the right distance and direction from the mouth of the Caloosahatchee River to dodge the red tide daggers that are spewing into the Gulf of Mexico. Like Ian’s cone and wind, we are on the periphery of the red tide concentration to our north. I’ve talked to several local fishing captains that have periodically smelled some red tide and seen a few dead fish here and there. I feel bad for Fort Myers and surrounding areas. They are getting the brunt of the algae bloom (again). I’m hopeful and praying that it subsides. I can’t handle watching fish suffocate while I ball in my mask like I did in 2018! Growing up in Naples, the red tides were infrequent and occurred exclusively in the summer and fall. Recent history, like everything else, has changed. We are more apt to get the red tide blooms in the winter than previously. Fingers crossed… Peace to all the marine critters!

I have become very ambivalent to holidays. When people come here to play, dive shop employees work hard! I’ll have to get myself back in that groove because we have not been working hard here lately. Thanksgiving was always my favorite, but even that holiday has morphed. Instead of being thankful for our blessings and the bountiful food at our disposal, we are thankful for the mall to open at midnight and cyber Friday to hurry up and get here. Hence the phrase Thanksgetting in the title above. In my mind however, I am not thinking of Thanksgetting in terms of being thankful for getting stuff. I’m thinking of it as getting ourselves in a mental state to be thankful. Let’s get some ‘Thanks’ in us! Despite the continual stream of chaos that seems to be a current part of human existence, we have so much to be thankful for! Jacque Cousteau and Scuba make my top ten. I’m super thankful for thanksgiving dinners. However, turkeys certainly aren’t thankful for Thanksgiving. Not a good time of the year to be poultry, but thank you turkeys!

I’m thankful for all of you! You have supported Scuba Marco for almost a quarter century and continue to allow Melody, John, Jessi and I to do what we love. This is true, but I still want to have a conversation with whoever came up with the phrase ‘do what you love and you’ll never work a day in your life’!

Until When, Live Love Dive. -Jeff