If you were to let go and walk into the water, and never look back, what is the last song you need to hear?

Posted 30Aug2017.

“1983 … (A Merman I Should Turn to Be)” by The Jimi Hendrix Experience.

Once upon a time, this was the first song on the “dive” playlist programmed into the paltry 256mb iRiver underwater MP3 player I wore on my weekly dives while I was stationed on Oahu a decade ago.

The lyrics, in the context of this question, make sense:

Hurrah i awake from yesterday
Alive but the war is here to stay
So my love Katherina and me
Decide to take our last walk
Through the noise to the sea
Not to die but to be re-born
Away from a life so battered and torn….
Forever…

An unfortunate coincidence:

This exact song was part of a discussion I had with a dive buddy on his first dive after fighting cancer on December 10, 2016:

…As our feet find the sand and the sea is straight ahead..
Straight ahead…..
Well its too bad
That our friends
Can’t be with us today…
Miss diving with you, Greg… enjoy – I shall be listening to my “Dive 2” playlist, thinking of you…

Less than 10 hours later, he was found unresponsive in the water after signalling to his group that he was returning back to shore due to not feeling well during the shallow (less than 30′ deep) and familiar dive in a place where we had frequented countless times before.