The High Dive

I used to have a fascination with Acapulco, Mexico.  Not sure why this was - perhaps it was the constant mention by Captain Stubing of the Love Boat as a final destination, or it could have been ABC's Wide World of Sports and their coverage of cliff jumping back in the 1970's.  I guess we, my brother and I must have watched a lot of it, because according to my mother, when we were very little, we asked an African American waiter at a restaurant if he was in fact a resident of Acapulco.

There is something entirely amazing about those divers who scale the cliffs in the early morning air, stand hundreds of feet above the ocean floor, toes over the edge, arms raised in the air seemingly scraping the clouds and think to themselves, "Yeah, it's a good idea to jump off this rock wall.  This is why I graduated from high school."  So we watched them tumble head over heels, descending rapidly, hands pushed over their heads and surprisingly, the cameras never picked up their screaming. 

The high dive is kind of where my own security level is.  I don't have a fear of heights, not yet, anyway and I remember one of the first times I ascended the 'high' diving board at the Buffalo Center pool when I was younger boy.  This was before all pools deconstructed the high dives because of wayward belly flops and landing on top of unsuspecting small children fifteen feet below - causes for lawsuits, of course.  I remember the feeling of being challenged by someone, some unknown face of a friend who uttered those words that every young person hopes to never hear: "I double dare you."  Now double daring is way worse than just a dare.  A double dare scrapes away the opportunity to actually decline the thing being dared.  It's like pushing all the chips in while playing poker.  You either do it, or else...

I don't know what the 'or else' is - no kid ever does; probably something to do with a few moments worth of shame and a weekend of being called a chicken.  Chickens have feelings, too.  Anyway, the lifeguards always had one eye on the high dive because if anything is going to go terribly wrong, that's the place - like a black hole of pain.  Under the watchful eye of the lifeguard, I ascended the stairs one step at a time.  From the ground, the high dive doesn't really look that high, kind of like a small leap off the sofa, but each consecutive step made the height look like we were moving to the top of the Sears Tower (now called the Willis Tower - after Die Hard Bruce Willis I'm sure.). 

When I actually reached the board, my little peg legs were starting to shake and I could see my faceless friends in the far reaches of the shallow end of the cold arms covering their cold chests, shivering with glee at my discomfort.  They pointed and I tried to wave at them, trying to make them see how brave I was and then the board bent a little bit and I grabbed the railing again.  The people behind me were not incredibly supportive: lots of  "C'mon, jump already" voices as if I was one of those people who climb out a window onto the ledge prepared to jump seventeen stories.  Even though the heart is willing, the brain is weak.  Everyone ahead of me had survived the leap, but there's always that chance...

So, I crept to the end of the board one eye on the lifeguard.  I kept hoping that she'd get a circle of well wishing adults to tread water below me, to catch me when I fell, to bring me to the side, to tell me what a brave boy I was, but how dumb would that be?  To actually put people below me in the water?  Try catching a sixty pound bowling ball from fifteen feet?

No one was there to catch me and as my toes inched out over the edge, I prayed a little: "Dear God, life is short, but it shouldn't be this short, and if I die from this height over the water, please give my baseball cards to my brother."  And then I just did it.  I meant to jump out - leap fearlessly into the void over the water, but at the last minute, by brain had second thoughts and tried to reel my body back to the board and instead of going feet first, it was head first - Acapulco style.

I don't remember much about the .3 seconds that it took for me to hit the water.  Probably equal parts exhilaration and terror, but at least I took a breath, a big one.  Then smack - wow, that hurt, but I was still alive and even though the water might be cold, there is something incredible about navigating in the depths - a sense of quiet that you don't get on land; a muffled sound with only my own thoughts streaming between my ears. 

It takes a little while to surface, and as much as you enjoy the underwater experience, sooner or later, lungs starting to ache a bit, you must come up for air: you must go break the plane of the aquatic existence to do it all over again.

 I think the high dive experience is what I go through every time I leave the U. S. to come back to Australia.  The first time we left, I crept to the edge wondering if there was going to be anyone to catch me, but soon, I was smacked in the face that this new world was not like the one I just left and even though the precipitous fall was both exhilarating and terrifying, I double clutched.  Then, hitting the water, swimming in the new place, navigating the muffled sound, enjoying the mystifying life in a different country and culture, I found myself recognizing that I needed to come up for air - to go back for a little bit. 

But I was unprepared for how different the voices sounded.  As we reached Canada after twenty-four hours of in transit activity, I was unprepared how different North Americans sounded - the pinched vowels, the hard 'R's, somewhat nasally reproductions of sounds.  After four years in Australia, long vowels, sort of mellifluous sentence structures (that might be going overboard a little bit with as much slang is slung here) I was taken aback and actually laughed a little bit.  "Do I actually sound like that?  Is that the way Australians hear me speak?"

So as we entered the airspace of the North American dialect, I prepared myself for the inevitable:  "Hey, Reid, you've got an accent."

Which is probably the case to a certain extent - Christine and I have both talked about this before: it's one of the hardest things to hear - my accent is part of who I am; it is a reminder of the place that from which I come.  When that is challenged, I found myself trying harder to sound more North American.  I didn't want anyone to think that I had 'gone native,' even though it's a very good thing to be able to be understood in the country in which you live.  During the five weeks I was there, I compared and contrasted Australian and American culture and language and incessantly I found I was trying to protect my American heritage even though I am very fond of my Australian culture also.  Perhaps that's why biblically speaking, the patriarchs always wanted to be buried in their homeland, or why people who have lived away from their home church for ninety percent to of their life still want to be interred at the 'home' cemetery. 

Your birthplace never gives up its grip.

So, this trip felt like my foray into high diving: a mini version of cliff jumping in Acapulco.  I was returning, coming up from underwater to hear my friends praise me for my heroism and bravery and when I finally did hear their voices, they sounded funny.  Maybe I sound funny?  Maybe I'm different?  Didn't someone say that time and experience change everything?

This five weeks was an excellent high dive experience.  Looking forward to sharing the next phase tomorrow: going home.