Adrenaline Lost: Reflections on Aging and the Search for New Purpose
Part 1... Realizations.
This old shark cage diving footage is making the rounds as “new news.” Being a lifelong shark enthusiast, several people have sent me this clip over the last few days.
Original clip:
Their text messages generally have a link to the article and video with some version of the phrase, “Can you imagine?”
Well, yes. Yes I can imagine.
I have been in those same cages, in that same water, and probably on that same boat. And I too have had a great while get stuck in my cage.
While my experience wasn’t quite so dramatic, I have been in a cage when a pregnant 16 foot female hit my cage so hard that her right fin shot through the horizontal opening, knocked the airline out of my mouth, and forced me to duck for cover. Above me - the thrashing white of the fin, and in front of me - a huge white stomach. The cage was shaking. Hollow aluminum cannot withstand a 4000 lb great white. I knew that. The dive crew had told us as much.
I took my left hand and pushed up against the stuck fin. My right hand reaching through the cage to push away the stomach. Anyone who knows me well knows I am very particular about my hands. Part of this peculiarity means I never wear gloves, even when diving. I still remember the feeling of my bare hands pushing away this rough mass of shark. Skin like sandpaper. Cold, and heavy. Pushing was doing nothing. Might as well push a parked dump truck.
It became a game of timing. Would the cage break in less time than I could hold my breath? The shark was stuck, and so was I.
Shark cages have an escape hatch. I could theoretically just swim out of the cage and up to the surface, but I had dive weights on - and I’m not a diver. I envisioned myself leaving the cage and just plummeting into the depths.
Then - just like that - she freed herself and swam off. The whole event lasting maybe 20 seconds.
A not-great photo I took of the shark in this story a few minutes before the events above. (This is also the trip that I learned how hard underwater photography was.)
While my experience was much less dramatic than the one in the video, it got me thinking.
What has happened to me? I used to love - and feel - adrenaline.
I was never a skydiving guy. I can barely handle a roller coaster, and my extreme sports days are long behind me. However, my “danger vice” was always animals.
When you could take a pic near the bears at the circus and the sign said “Don’t touch the bear.” - I would always touch the bear.
When they needed one person from the VFX team of THE SORCERER’S APPRENTICE to handle the 4 wolf pack that was brought in for filming (This meant getting locked in the cage with them to prep for shoots) I jumped at the chance - shocked that of the entire crew, nobody else wanted to.
*His name was Samson, and for scale, I’m 6’ tall and his head is as big as my torso. (He was a good boy. I had my hands in his mouth a LOT.)
When I started shark diving, I even had a list of the top-5 sharks I wanted to swim with - And I checked off 3 (Great White, Mako, and Whale Sharks. Never got around to Tigers, and lost interest in Bull Sharks.)
*A pic of me, taking a pic of a 30 foot whale shark off Holbox Island, Mexico.
Yet today - at 47 years old, adrenaline has all but left my life. The only “adrenaline” I seem to get these days is waiting for colonoscopy results. it’s sad, and I only realize how sad it is when I see videos like the one above and remember what that feeling was like.
Why does this happen? Does this have to happen? I know in my case, LIFE happened. My father passed away, my wife got pregnant, we started a family, and “Let’s go dive with sharks for a week” turned into “Lets go see grandma for a week.” Don’t get me wrong - I’m the first one to give a HELL YA to a trip to Disneyland, but it’s not the same.
“You are a dad now - you can’t keep doing this!” is a common retort to these concerns. But why not? Tell that to my friend Eli Martinez, he is a great dad and literally lives adventure. He is even a part time meme:
So my question is - at 47, with a depleted adrenaline bank - what does one do?
Short answer: I’m not sure - but I want to find out.
This isn’t going to be a consistent series - more of a bunch of updates as I try and figure out what it is that gets my heart racing again! If you have any suggestions - please leave a comment!
Or— follow this adventure: