Prologue: The supporting cast

I mentioned in the introduction to The Right Blue that this project is part memoir, and part travelogue. Of course, we didn't do all of those thousands of dives or travel all of those thousands of miles alone.

Over the years we have enjoyed the companionship of many other divers and fellow travelers. In many ways, the stories we will tell here are theirs as well as ours.

We're still in touch with many of our old dive buddies and travel companions, so we decided to tell them about The Right Blue project, and to invite them to participate in whatever way they wish.

We have no doubt that our old friends will be interested to see the photos and read the stories we post here. We have no doubt that this project will evoke memories for them as it does for us. What we are hoping is that they will be inspired to add to what we have to say by sharing some of their photos, adding their versions to our stories -- and telling some of their own tales as well.

At the very least, we are asking our old friends to add their comments to the blog posts, and to give us permission to post some photos we have of them. At best, we're hoping that we can convince our lifelong friends to contribute some of their own photos, and to write guest posts about their undersea experiences, too.

So here's a shout out to all of our former dive buddies and travel companions (you know who you are!). Dig out your old photos, conjure up your memories and write them down, and then email the lot to us. We'd like nothing better than to turn The Right Blue into a community project.

P.S. That's one of our long-time diver friends in the photo on this page. I wonder if she'll recognize herself and be able to recall when and where the photo was taken...