Monday, April 9, 2007
What's On Your Shirt?
I just sent in the last bit of paperwork required to complete my application to be a volunteer diver at the New York Aquarium and I'm giddy as a baby monkey with a bag full of banana jelly beans. Except that I'm not throwing jelly beans at innocent passersby... mostly because there's no one else in this room.
I first stole the idea for signing up as a volunteer diver when I was still back in dear, old Virginny and I'd read some-random-someone-on-a-messageboard's awesome experiences as a diver at the Baltimore Aquarium.
"Well, expletive-deleted YEAH! That would be dope!" I thought, as I surfed on over to the Baltimore Aquarium's website and filled out all the appropriate paperwork. I filled out my family's medical history back to the mid-11th century as I entertained daydreams of diving coral reefs in the middle of February only a short drive from home. It was so exciting a prospect to know that, at any given time, it would only be a week or so until I got to be in warm water with colorful fish again, as opposed to being in the cold-ass quarry, avoiding zebra-mussel inflicted incisions in my drysuit.
"Any day," I continued to tell myself as the weeks passed, "Any day, now. They'll email me and say that they love me and, not only do they want to make me their chief volunteer diver, but they also want to give me cookies and ice cream."
They never did. No cookies. No email. Bupkis.
So now, here I am. Or, rather, there I was, about two months ago, sitting at work, trying to think of more efficient ways to procrastinate until 6:00 when I stumble across THIS fantastic thread on the Oceanblue Divers messageboard. (Note to all board readers/posters: Ya'll gotta get that thing moving. I'm running out of internet to look at while I'm supposed to be working.)
"The New York Aquarium, huh? Who'd've thunk there'd be one of those up here?" I mean, sure, I'd been there tons when I was a kid. But what kind of twisted pervert actually remembers their childhood? After a good deal of well-weighted deliberation (i.e., after I went to the vending machine to get a Ginger Ale) I called Richard Blankfein, the friendly gentleman who runs the volunteer program, to schedule a spot in one of their orientation meetings. No lengthy, foolishly-optimistic wait… just "C'mon in." Everything was already coming up daisies.
For those of you that ain’t been: the NY Aquarium is right on Coney Island in Brooklyn. I mean, right on the boardwalk. It snowed the day before I went and the sand was covered in snow and ice. There was a couple pulling their kid on a sled across the beach. That was friggin' confusing.
Mr. Blankfein is an older fella with the energy of a Labrador puppy who got into the coffee grounds. He talks fast and to the point, with an air of seeming to have as much patience for horseplay as for nuclear weaponry. He walks even faster. I liked him immediately.
There were about eight of us potential volunteers sitting in the meeting room covered in prints featuring Beluga whales and such as we listened to his introduction to the aquarium itself and the volunteer diving program. He explained what was required and expected of the volunteers and made it dazzlingly clear that working as a volunteer was just as much a commitment as being an employee. After the introductions he walked us through a tour of the facilities. Powerwalked us, I should say.
I'd like to say that I was Joe Cool about getting a behind-the-scenes tour of the joint. I wasn't though. To see the things that make the magic of the place work: the tank systems, the kitchens, the tops of the mock habitats, and this is to say nothing of how close to the critters he took us. Oh, JEEZ! I was very not-cool.
"Through here are pens for the pinnipeds," said our amphetamine-in-sneakers of a tour guide as he swung through a door. We all followed him into a long corridor of wall on the right and chain link fence on the left.
Not to get too heavily mired in physiology, but you must understand, there's a part of the brain, the hippocampus or the medulla or the superego or something... its job is to let information through. Kind of like a filtration system, only allowing so much data in at a time so the top of your head doesn't explode into a teeny mushroom cloud. What happened next temporarily broke that part of my brain.
Something moved about two feet away from me to the left, on the other side of the chain link. Something that had an enormity that filled my peripheral vision. Momentarily becoming a high-schooler in an 80s slasher movie, I turned to look.
"Yeah, that's totally not really there," said that filter part of my brain.
"OK," I said, naive enough to believe my own brain.
Then the big thing blinked. That seemed to reboot my head long enough to recognize that it was real.
It was a walrus. Well, a walrus head, anyway. I couldn't see the whole walrus, as it was large enough that a good portion of it must have been in New Zealand. The head alone seemed the size of the minifridge I brought with me to Rutgers. And it was looking at me.
"What's up, dude?" I asked.
"BRUMMMFFFFF." Said the walrus, covering me with fishbreath stink and, I'm sure, one or two walrus boogers.
Even before that moment I was pretty sure I was going to do my damndest to be a part of that program, but being just a few feet from a walrus sealed the deal. (Sealed the deal. Get it? ... Never mind.)
"So what will you be doing?" A friend asked me over some beers later.
"Cleaning fish poop and talking to visitors mostly."
"And what's cool about that?"
"It's... I... It's the aquarium, dude! The aquarium!"
"Nothing you can possibly say can convince me that cleaning up fish shit is cool."
Some people just don't get it.
But for me... man, I’ve just got to get in on this program. If for nothing else, so that I can give that walrus his comeuppance for getting boogers on me. So I've sent in the last of the paperwork and, with a little luck, I'll hear back soon. I'm unspeakably eager to get on this Coney Island coaster. I'll let you know how she rides.
I first stole the idea for signing up as a volunteer diver when I was still back in dear, old Virginny and I'd read some-random-someone-on-a-messageboard's awesome experiences as a diver at the Baltimore Aquarium.
"Well, expletive-deleted YEAH! That would be dope!" I thought, as I surfed on over to the Baltimore Aquarium's website and filled out all the appropriate paperwork. I filled out my family's medical history back to the mid-11th century as I entertained daydreams of diving coral reefs in the middle of February only a short drive from home. It was so exciting a prospect to know that, at any given time, it would only be a week or so until I got to be in warm water with colorful fish again, as opposed to being in the cold-ass quarry, avoiding zebra-mussel inflicted incisions in my drysuit.
"Any day," I continued to tell myself as the weeks passed, "Any day, now. They'll email me and say that they love me and, not only do they want to make me their chief volunteer diver, but they also want to give me cookies and ice cream."
They never did. No cookies. No email. Bupkis.
So now, here I am. Or, rather, there I was, about two months ago, sitting at work, trying to think of more efficient ways to procrastinate until 6:00 when I stumble across THIS fantastic thread on the Oceanblue Divers messageboard. (Note to all board readers/posters: Ya'll gotta get that thing moving. I'm running out of internet to look at while I'm supposed to be working.)
"The New York Aquarium, huh? Who'd've thunk there'd be one of those up here?" I mean, sure, I'd been there tons when I was a kid. But what kind of twisted pervert actually remembers their childhood? After a good deal of well-weighted deliberation (i.e., after I went to the vending machine to get a Ginger Ale) I called Richard Blankfein, the friendly gentleman who runs the volunteer program, to schedule a spot in one of their orientation meetings. No lengthy, foolishly-optimistic wait… just "C'mon in." Everything was already coming up daisies.
For those of you that ain’t been: the NY Aquarium is right on Coney Island in Brooklyn. I mean, right on the boardwalk. It snowed the day before I went and the sand was covered in snow and ice. There was a couple pulling their kid on a sled across the beach. That was friggin' confusing.
Mr. Blankfein is an older fella with the energy of a Labrador puppy who got into the coffee grounds. He talks fast and to the point, with an air of seeming to have as much patience for horseplay as for nuclear weaponry. He walks even faster. I liked him immediately.
There were about eight of us potential volunteers sitting in the meeting room covered in prints featuring Beluga whales and such as we listened to his introduction to the aquarium itself and the volunteer diving program. He explained what was required and expected of the volunteers and made it dazzlingly clear that working as a volunteer was just as much a commitment as being an employee. After the introductions he walked us through a tour of the facilities. Powerwalked us, I should say.
I'd like to say that I was Joe Cool about getting a behind-the-scenes tour of the joint. I wasn't though. To see the things that make the magic of the place work: the tank systems, the kitchens, the tops of the mock habitats, and this is to say nothing of how close to the critters he took us. Oh, JEEZ! I was very not-cool.
"Through here are pens for the pinnipeds," said our amphetamine-in-sneakers of a tour guide as he swung through a door. We all followed him into a long corridor of wall on the right and chain link fence on the left.
Not to get too heavily mired in physiology, but you must understand, there's a part of the brain, the hippocampus or the medulla or the superego or something... its job is to let information through. Kind of like a filtration system, only allowing so much data in at a time so the top of your head doesn't explode into a teeny mushroom cloud. What happened next temporarily broke that part of my brain.
Something moved about two feet away from me to the left, on the other side of the chain link. Something that had an enormity that filled my peripheral vision. Momentarily becoming a high-schooler in an 80s slasher movie, I turned to look.
"Yeah, that's totally not really there," said that filter part of my brain.
"OK," I said, naive enough to believe my own brain.
Then the big thing blinked. That seemed to reboot my head long enough to recognize that it was real.
It was a walrus. Well, a walrus head, anyway. I couldn't see the whole walrus, as it was large enough that a good portion of it must have been in New Zealand. The head alone seemed the size of the minifridge I brought with me to Rutgers. And it was looking at me.
"What's up, dude?" I asked.
"BRUMMMFFFFF." Said the walrus, covering me with fishbreath stink and, I'm sure, one or two walrus boogers.
Even before that moment I was pretty sure I was going to do my damndest to be a part of that program, but being just a few feet from a walrus sealed the deal. (Sealed the deal. Get it? ... Never mind.)
"So what will you be doing?" A friend asked me over some beers later.
"Cleaning fish poop and talking to visitors mostly."
"And what's cool about that?"
"It's... I... It's the aquarium, dude! The aquarium!"
"Nothing you can possibly say can convince me that cleaning up fish shit is cool."
Some people just don't get it.
But for me... man, I’ve just got to get in on this program. If for nothing else, so that I can give that walrus his comeuppance for getting boogers on me. So I've sent in the last of the paperwork and, with a little luck, I'll hear back soon. I'm unspeakably eager to get on this Coney Island coaster. I'll let you know how she rides.
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