Swimming with Sharks

Flaubert had excellent advice for writers: “Be steady and well-ordered in your life so that you can be fierce and original in your work.” But let’s face it, months of quiet reflection in front of a blank screen dulls the senses. So when the opportunity to swim with sharks, hand-feed stingrays and go on a moray eel hunt came up, I grabbed it. My mother, not knowing that a brush with a Category 4 cyclone would be included in this expedition, would tell you I signed us up for the Jaws IV excursion because I was desperate for new blog topics. 

So what did one learn when surrounded by nine black-tipped sharks gunning for fish guts dished out by a smiling Polynesian missing two fingers? Fear. Serious fear. The kind that paralyses you for about five very long seconds before a hot burst of adrenalin screams down your spine, commanding your arms and legs to disobey your brain, which is telling you not to move erratically so that the sharks will not mistake you for bait. 

Then, before you can say “Jacques Cousteau”, a large flap of warm velvet envelopes your leg and moves to your waist. A stingray and his many cousins behind him are looking for lunch. We’d been warned that if they appeared they would be frenzied with hunger since the cyclone’s 35 foot waves curtailed regular meals from foolish, sunburned tourists like us. 

So when the rays with the suction power of a Hoover on steroids come at you like a slow motion pack of wild dogs, completely boxing you in with the sharks, your thought processes become compromised. A kind of lighter than air, sickeningly sweet sense of false hope takes over. You think: perhaps sharks like the taste of stingray more than Banana Boat sun lotion. And perhaps if you use your bleeding sardines wisely, the stingrays will nail the sharks with their nasty barbs while you haul your shivering hide back onto the outrigger where the dive master is handing out slivers of coconuts and bananas instead of the rum punch you so desperately need.

This is also the same moment you notice that everyone else on the boat is still dry and you were the only idiot stupid enough to jump in the water with a huge pack of 4 to 5 foot long seriously hungry sharks and rays. Except for . . . your mother, who is still in the water. It is at that moment that she raises her head long enough to ask you to take a picture, and you suddenly realize that you are not doing this insane dive trip for a blog, or to reawaken your senses. You’re doing this for the unforgettable sight of your mother grinning like a ten-year-old, and having as much fun as you are.

Oh, and by the way, there was a writerly benefit in the end. Experiencing visceral reactions such as these really do help create more authentic stories. For example, when the heroine in my upcoming February 23^rd release, Secrets of a Scandalous Bride, comes face to face with the obsessed predator from her past, she has a similar reaction to my moment in the chum.

I love hearing other people’s stories. What wild, unforgettable adventure have you had? And what was the real reason behind doing it?