Happy New Year!!!!

Happy 2015 everybody! I feel like this new year has lots of amazing adventures in store for me! I’m just one dive away from earning my open water, scuba diving license! Luke and I have successfully passed all the written tests and on December 30th we went diving with Scuba Edwen (our instructor from Honduras) for our first open water diving test. We basically repeated all the skills we had learned in the pool tests, but this time at a much further depth. 

It was such a weird sensation to breath with a tank in a pool. For some reason, I was a bit freaked out when we took out our breathing apparatuses or when we we flooded our masks, even though I knew I was perfectly fine and able to swim up a foot to the surface for air. I think it was because I had never had the issue of getting water up my nose while I was swimming, thanks to Grandma’s swimming lessons every summer. But I was now having to teach my body to breath in thru my mouth, out thru the nose, underwater. Surprisingly, I was a lot more comfortable and calm completing all the tasks in the ocean than when we did them in the pool. I always feel a bit at home when I’m under the water. They say that a diver either feels thrilled or at peace when they are diving. I have definitely had lots of excitement when I happened upon new discoveries underwater, like the shipwreck dive I did as my very first scuba excursion back in 2010 in Brazil, or the sea turtle I got to examine up close at the ocean’s floor in Cozumel. But I also feel an amazing sense of tranquility while I’m floating along beneath the rest of the world. It’s pure bliss. 

I absolutely love being in the water. We are scheduled to have our final open water dive on the 13th, and I’m hoping we will get to do a ship wreck dive! I still have a bucket list of animals I want to see while I’m diving, which includes a large jellyfish (I’ve only seen the minuscule ones), a seahorse, dolphins, sharks, and whales. I plan to continue diving in any location I find myself in so I can see the aquatic life the area has to offer me! Hudson river, here I come ;) 

I have had an interesting past couple of weeks because Melissa has been injured so I had to step in as her understudy in the flying track of Center Stage. That means I’ve been doing bungee!!!! It’s hard work and a bit painful on my wrist and shoulders but it’s a lot of fun! We have conditioning and understudy rehearsals every cruise so I felt well prepared to go in. This doesn’t mean I didn’t feel the butterflies when I did it in the show for the first time! :) I now have some great footage to add to my demo reel, and to show my family and friends when I get home! 

For some more exciting news, I plan on visiting Sean after this contract! I’ve been wanting to volunteer at a panda center in China for awhile, and my wonderful brother just happens to live there so I figured, why not see him too!?! I’ve also been invited to visit my friend Joce in the Philippines, so I will be flying to stay with her for a bit after my time in China. 

One of the hardest things about having a contract this long is all the opportunities you feel like you are missing out on. I’m constantly battling with myself to not worry about the auditions I can’t attend because I’m on this cruise ship. The only thing that seems to help is to plan for the future while still enjoying the present. I have short term goals, like the dives I want to participate in or the projects I want to complete. I also have long term goals, starting with my plans after the contract ends in May. I use the short term goals to keep myself on track day to day; I’m always trying to better my dancing and other skills that will help me achieve my long term goals. 

The world seems to continue to open up for me, as I’m finding myself drawn towards pursuing my love for dance and my passion for animals. I’ve been researching more and more the opportunities in the fields of animal research and rescue. There are several volunteer trips I would love to do that combine scuba diving with marine research, which just seems like the perfect thing for me! I’m not quite sure which path I want to take but I can’t wait to see which direction I head in the years to come!