Flame Angels

by Robert Wintner

  Are you okay?

  Then it was on to pointing out what mere tourists might see unassisted only in the rare extreme. They came so far and spent so much — and spent it here — that they should not miss an octopus snuggled in a crevasse, her skin identical in color and texture to the substrate. Or a dwarf pencil eel, or garden eels, or a shark hovering on the verge or resting under a ledge. Or a manta, whale, monk seal, reef shark, coral bloom, flame angel, pyramid butterflies in a column from a hundred-foot depth up to twenty.

  Are you okay? How much air do you have left? Okay, we go out and around to the right. Okay?

  Water schlep? How about water doctor? Or water lawyer? Or water accountant? How about that? Yes, the schlep occurred at sunrise and again at the end of the trip, when all those tanks and gear had to go back the way they came. So? Are not a man’s muscles defined by his labors? Does he not carry the loads of labor and professional responsibility with assurance, aplomb and dispatch? The short answer is yes — even if he grunts on the offload. The truth was that he was a waterman of first-caliber reputation and regard among the fleet!

  Beyond physical prowess and professional skill, an evolving man will seek greater success by being more things to more people. Among Ravid’s realm of fearlessness was the spending arena. He spent foolishly only when foolish spending was in order, like on another round for friends who would go deeper than the dive plan and risk all for him as he would do for them, and on tipping the waitress lavishly, since she gave her all as well and needed to make ends meet along with the rest. Besides, every now and then a reasonably fresh waitress who hadn’t been on the job long enough to ruin her posture or give her hemorrhoids might turn her sparkling countenance on he who spent so freely. She might assess the tip in his heart and hope it could be spent as lavishly. Or she might just dive in, which every waterwoman will do now and then, looking for the tip in his pants.

  Well, either/or was A-OK, but waitresses were exceptions to the rule, most of them having seen and heard every line ever invented and delivered by every Barnacle Bill or tourist wannabe who ever bellied up.

  The salient aspect of Ravid’s discretionary spending was his thorough disregard for return on investment. Freely spending — what the boys called “pissing it down the rat hole” — was an act of liberation, a statement of life, liberty and anarchy. Ravid’s inspiration came one morning on the back wall of Molokini Crater, a deep dive by necessity with swells typically banging the wall at the surface, making turbulence down to fifty or sixty feet. The day was normal, calling for expert guidance. At ninety feet, the divers could spread their wings and fly on the current; not a novice dive but a real crowd-pleaser. The back wall got a few jitters churning among the “intermediates,” mostly accountants, insurance agents, businesspeople and the most intractable of any social segment, the doctors. Your average intermediate had between twenty and fifty dives and most often compensated for anxiety with effusive good cheer. Never mind; Ravid would take care of them, beginning with a little humor to ease the tension, telling them that the wall went down four hundred feet to a ledge that jutted out a bit and then down to eight hundred feet, making the back wall a bottomless dive, but not to worry, because the second dive would be much shallower, and topless. Oh, how they loved his joie de vivre in the face of danger, which, what the heck, made for just another day at the office for him — and us too, come to think of it, out here on our own in the deep blue sea.

  On this particular morning at the back wall, a tourist handed Ravid a severely expensive looking camera in an underwater housing with a huge glass bubble in front — the dome port over the lens. He didn’t hand it over for keeps but, please, to get some excellent photos of the tourist and his former fiancée, as of yesterday his wife. Ravid’s own thought bubble filled with: Did he say excellent photos? To which the tourist said, as if reading Ravid, “Don’t worry,” pointing out the important two buttons among the thirty or so available. “Press this, here, for auto focus. And this for your shutter. Get us within six feet. Okay?”

  Okay.

  Well, the shots came out excellent, though Ravid felt that excellence derived mechanically and not from anything he’d done, till the tourist pointed out that yes, the mechanical aspect had gone without a flaw, because the whole thing was automatic, which was taken for granted until somebody did it wrong, which Ravid did not do. The tourist seemed psychic here, as if knowing that Ravid would likely have a good eye. More to the point, the composition was balanced by the huge, yellow-margin moray peeking in from the right, as if to wish the newlyweds good luck, and the curious jack cruising in from the left, as if to wink, because he’d known the wife. “You can’t hire shots like this,” the tourist said, and then tipped the crew a hundred dollars.

  Ravid dismissed this praise according to habit, as he tried to dismiss most praise and criticism, since most was impulsive and unwarranted. Yet he savored the concept of excellence for a week and then another week, realizing that he might indeed have felt Neptune’s presence in framing the eel, the jack and the newlyweds. He’d taken for granted his eye — his gift — for composition and balance. He could as easily have moved three feet forward or back to frame the eel and a massive coral head, or the jack and three hundred pyramid angels in the water column — he could have composed and balanced several different ways, all perfect, because he, uniquely among divers, saw the sea with instinct. His eye and balance could set him apart from 99.9 percent of every other diver or dive master or dive instructor in the world. Swimming schlep? Why must she use such degrading language? Would she really be happier if I wore a suit and got fat? Yes, she would, so let it go.

  So he let it go, feeling — to coin a San Francisco phrase learned not too long ago — the passion release itself a few days later during another dive prep. Pulling his cummerbund snug, clipping in his waist and chest straps, humping the whole rig higher onto his back and cinching his front strap D-rings, he paused as if with sudden notice, telling his enrapt audience, “Those are angelfish you’ll see in the water column, not with wings and harps and white robes, but they truly are angels, as you’ll see in their amazing color and grace.” Oh, they loved him, plunging eagerly to the depths for a sample of the magic he so sprightly conveyed.

  In the next week he visited an underwater photographer and a camera store, and in the next week spent two of the three thousand dollars he owned on a camera, housing, lens and dome port, used. He would wait on the strobes, to be sure, though the strobes came the following week for another six hundred, also used, because he’d taken many shots that might have been great but came out blue-green and slightly fuzzy, because color goes away below forty feet and light brings it back and into focus. For two weeks more he practiced taking pictures of tourists, and then, approved by his boss, the boat owner, charged ten dollars per shot, with two dollars per shot going to the boat.

  When Ravid Rockulz had taken underwater pictures for six months on Maui’s most popular dive sites, he sent a portrait study of a giant moray eel to the biggest, best-known natural history magazine in the world. The shots were not only extraordinary for clarity, composition and detail but also the best portraiture ever captured of the elusive nocturnal giant moray. Ravid had gone alone soon after dark to dive to fifty feet at the pinnacles a quarter mile off Black Rock in front of the Sheraton Hotel on the Westside. He dismissed the endless chiding of friends and colleagues, who scolded tirelessly that the smart diver does not dive alone. At night? Are you nuts?

  Well, maybe he was a tad whacked, but isn’t that the nature of artistic fervor? Besides that, the safety rules were always good to consider, but if truth be told, a few were plain useless. Like the one demanding a buddy on every dive. Only a fool would dive without a buddy anytime, given a choice. But a photographer at depth will soon be alone anyway. If his buddy is also shooting, then each will drift to a different subject — a hundred feet apart is the same as alone in the best conditions. At night, twenty feet of separation might as well be solitude. If his
buddy isn’t shooting, separation will be quick. No buddy wants to wait on a photographer working with a fish, waiting for the fish to calm down and sense no threat, so the fish can approach socially, its curiosity captured by the best. Ravid knew these practical realities, snorkeling out to the pinnacles off Black Rock that night — snorkeling to save the air in his tank. He also knew of the night beasts who hear splashing as the sound of injury and an easy meal.

  So he descended on rationale; yes, he could be with another photographer. They’d drift apart on separate pursuits and not meet again till it was done, back on the beach, which would be no safer and could cause more worry, too, if either was late or came out elsewhere.

  Beyond that, the pinnacles off Black Rock were only a short swim off the point, even if the point was a bit farther out than the beach. At a depth of fifty feet, it felt manageable, especially with no shore break.

  And things went smoothly at first. A diver has only two hands, both required by a camera, leaving no hand for the flashlight in the inky darkness. Not to worry though, the smart diver — Ravid, in this case — used one hand to light his sphere of visibility: some lovely coral, a big, sleeping parrotfish and a few ghastly conger eels. Then he wedged his light in his BC to turn on his camera. He checked switches by memory — so many switches and knobs, too many, more than any shot would require. Never mind. The flashlight squirmed like a restless child till it shined up under his chin, blinding him, working free and then falling free. Not to worry; he grabbed it in time, holding the camera in the other hand and noting a subtle but valuable aspect of underwater work, that something dropped could be easily retrieved with presence of mind and an easy reach. Then he turned suddenly, to a presence felt rather than seen, and on coming nose to nose with a giant moray eel, he gasped.

  The eel wasn’t so much bigger than himself, unless they could have stood back-to-back on their tiptoes, stretching the eel’s curves. The eel would have won by a foot and a half with similar girth. Worse was the moray’s presumption. Opening wide in an obtrusive display of very long teeth in many rows crowding the fleshy maw, the eel assessed the plausibility of swallowing the prey before him. Ravid cringed, as it were, to a more palatable size.

  As his heart and sphincter slammed shut in the face of death, Ravid turned away, one hand grasping his light and the other on his camera, with no hand for the knife strapped above his ankle. Well, what could he do with a knife, anyway, stab a giant moray? He might discourage it, but it could bleed, encouraging others. Or an outright attack might stimulate response in kind, causing Ravid to bleed, discouraging him. Glancing into the ink-black water of his retreat, he opted against the knife. He could make the beach on instinct and compass bearing, but dropping his light would render it pitch dark with no alternative but a surface swim. He would gain nothing by dropping the camera, except the chance for a one-handed knife fight with a giant moray, who would likely be the least of his problems, and a camera could come in handy as a sacrificial chomp for other gregarious feeders.

  So it was flight over fight, jamming the fear-frozen muscles into overdrive on adrenaline thrust. He sensed a proper course to survival, determining the critical need for, and making a mental note to buy, a spare light. But he slowed into knowing: The sea is innocent, its predatory nature based on fundamental need, which is not psychotic, perverse or similar to human motive. Small fry gobble plankton. Boxfish eat small fry, and so on up the menu. Nobody in the sea kills for sport or personal aggrandizement or compensation for lesser attributes, or for photo-ops or mental derangement. Hunger and defense drive the system. This so-called giant met by chance hails from forebears and a social context far less egregious than my own. So?

  So the flight stopped a long but short way from the point of origin. So the diver turned to see the giant moray also turning back from the verge, perhaps lured back by the light now shining his way, reengaged, socially, perhaps. Ravid pointed the light askew to avoid blinding the giant. He shone it on himself so the giant could see, among other things, no harm intended and that he, the diver, would not qualify as prey, not without a severe risk of indigestion and heartburn on so much neoprene, nylon, plastic and steel. So the giant moray snaked gracefully back to social proximity as the camera rose into place, as the diver’s innate skill kept him neutrally buoyant. With the light angled obliquely, the subject was lit with dramatic shadow, overtone, nuance and clarity. Aiming the camera one-handed, Ravid held his breath. Noise and bubbles ceased, and there in the black water off the point in the faint glow of a tiny nightlight, a tableau formed, in which a tentative being assessed the nature and intention of another being of equal uncertainty on a chance meeting in a dark hallway.

  So the big galoot came on like a stranger from the country, with eye contact, cautious curiosity and shared interests. In near intimacy, each creature scanned the other. One sniffed the strange, new fish with the bulbous bug-eye. The other made a soft clicking noise as the shutter opened again and again on the eyes, the mottled skin, the dilating nostrils, all four of them, and hundreds of teeth, some in need of flossing and all defying a neat tuck into the maw. The eel breathed as eels do, opening and closing to push water over the gills and pursing a word, Aaaaloha. The giant moray eased to apparent bliss and beatitude in communion never before seen, much less photographed.

  “Photos by Ravid Rockulz” in National Geographic magazine changed life materially for three days of giddy excitement. First was the arrival of greatness and recouping his total outlay to date on camera equipment. Second was enough left over to sustain the celebration into the wee hours with enough cash remaining to plunk down on the waitress’ tray and — third — encourage a night of company, though the company was secured hours before with such success at hand.

  But life for Ravid changed in the long term too. Here was substance, vision and purpose instead of a void. Here too was the ephemeral nature of greatness; it fades fast unless fed. So he stood tall, ready to step up. He’d cleared the outfield bleachers and could do it again. He knew he could, though he feared the eerie feeling of invincibility that accompanied him. He could do no wrong — except that he could, like anyone of developing skills will err more often than your average spectator.

  So he practiced humility, till a successful photographer said he used the same strobe as Ravid and loved the focus light setting that both spared the battery and served as a flashlight, freeing things up. Ravid blushed. Who knew? So many buttons!

  The old pro saw his reaction and said, “Oh, man — you got that weird lighting by holding the light out to the side!” Ravid did not deny it, and greatness got boosted again.

  The bad news was that he couldn’t tell his mother of his success. Well, he could but chose not to; it was so premature, too early in the game. Maybe he held back in self-defense against her inevitable critique: So? So what? You going to retire now? So now what do I say you do? You took a picture of a fish for a magazine, and now you’re retired, except for the swim schlep every day of your life? The question of motivation could sting or itch, a scorpion or a mosquito. Best to duck under a pillow; he would tell her when he had one more magazine credit, or maybe three more.

  When You Least Expect It

  But futures have a way of forming up with minds of their own. No matter how many shots of exquisite beauty, character and wonder Ravid sent off, they all came back with a form rejection. He called to ask why, when his shots were clearly superior to the shots actually appearing in the magazine, not that those shots are bad, Sir, it’s just that... And so he got the news:

  1. We’re not your personal gallery.

  2. You got lucky on some eel shots. Your color balance was slightly off, and your water was more turbid than we like to see. They were original enough to warrant coverage, and we hope you enjoyed the exposure.

  3. You were good to send us your photos. They are, for the most part, well done, but...

  4. We don’t build stories around photos. We commission photos to go with our stories.

 
“Okay, then. Perfect. You can give me a commission.”