A Letter to Dr Sylvia Earle

Dr Earle, 

I just finished reading your 1995 book "Sea Change: A Message of the Oceans" and it might as well have been called "Sea Change: An inspiration for Rachel". That's how I feel, after reading your book - inspired. Awed, mind numbed, and inspired. 

I'm a super novice diver, having only been under the sea surface < 20 times. But I understand the wonder, and the excitement, and the enjoyment of feeling like you're flying and the freedom to move about how you can't move on land. Front flips, side rolls, or diving upside down if you want - you can do it all that you can't do on land. And really that's just a manifestation of what's happening. Because when I dive, and I find enjoyment in the flips, it's because I am HAPPY. 

Happy to be lucky enough to be having that experience, lucky that the reef was alive and healthy, lucky that water exists in the first place, and lucky that the entire ocean isn't a total polluted wreck. But I haven't been diving in 4 years and I can only guess what changes have happened since. 

Plastic is everywhere. Trash is everywhere. Salinities are changing. Water and air temperatures are rising. Cyclonic storms are stronger and more common. Fish are dying. Large seafaring creatures are being murdered illegally, brutally, and/or accidentally. Coral reefs are becoming bleached and dying. 

It's really depressing. 

But the depressing parts are what motivate me to action, and it seems to be something that motivates you as well. As I read your book that was written in the early 1990s, I could see the path you were headed down. You sounded frustrated, but motivated, and I already knew that by 2019 you had succeeded in founding Mission Blue and the Hope Spots program. 

And that gives me hope. Hope that I can be similarly inspired to spark change, to power conservation, and to follow in your flipper eddies. Hope that even though I'm in my 30s, that I've only just begun the fight. I am inspired by your life and everything you have achieved and seen, and I hope to someday be even a quarter as effective as you have in global conservation efforts. 

Thank you for your inspiration and for being one of my heroes!