Sometimes, when I need an easy answer, I blame it all on Shamu. Every summer, when I was a child, my dad would drive my younger sister, Randi, and me to Sea World in Aurora, Ohio, to watch the famous Orca whale perform. During the car trip home to Pittsburgh, I used to imagine myself in a wetsuit with a microphone and bucket of raw fish, playing with whales and dolphins.

And that’s where the dream began.

Other childhood vacations were spent on the Outer Banks, the barrier islands off mainland North Carolina. Randi and I would play for hours in the tide pools carved by the Atlantic surf.

If my dad didn’t join us for a swim, he stood knee-deep in the water as our lifeguard, imbuing in me a fearful respect for the ocean’s strength through his own vigilance. We learned to float passively on our backs should we ever be trapped in a rip current. We learned how to tell the difference between the dorsal fin of a shark and that of its harmless, cartilaginous relative, the skate. The ocean became more than a theme park. It was blustery, unpredictable, and I was in love.

My love did not go unrequited for long. Danny and Judy, friends of my mom, tired of the frantic pace of city life in Pittsburgh and moved with their two children on to a 45-foot wooden cruiser in the Florida Keys. When I was 12, my mom arranged for me to live on board for three weeks to learn how to dive.

Every day in Key Largo came and went with a drowsy, sun-kissed rhythm. Despite the slow cadence of island life, I approached my study of scuba with zeal. To earn my certification, I had to complete several ocean dives. I couldn’t wait.

My love for the sea turned to passion after my first breath of compressed air under open water. The white noise of the terrestrial world disappears the moment your head slips beneath the surface, and you can hear only your own slow, continuous breaths—followed by the soothing murmur of exhaust bubbles. You descend through rays of light before reaching your desired depth, at which point, if you are weighted properly, you achieve neutral buoyancy, where you neither sink nor float.

You hang, suspended in liquid, the ocean bottom rising up to meet you. You shift into the dazzling dimension of aqueous time and space, where sound travels faster and objects appear larger and closer. Scuba gear weighs nothing under water, and the dance of a single fish can hold the attention of even the most restless mind until it’s time to ascend.

When I returned home from the Keys, I spent hours watching underwater travelogues on cable TV. I subscribed to Skin Diver, Woman Diver, and Sail magazines. I waddled around the house in my fins, sucking air through my snorkle. Landlocked in Pittsburgh, my passion became an obsession—that kept me afloat as I struggled with the awkwardness of being a 13-year-old girl.

It was time for high school, and I was sent to a locally renowned, coed private school, where what you wore was more important than who you were. Invisible and friendless, I somehow managed to make it through my freshman year, all the while dreaming of open water.

That summer, my parents forked over an embarrassingly large amount of money for me to hack it out in the British Virgin Islands on a 51-foot sailing sloop named Shibumi, with seven other kids from fancy prep schools in New York.

I learned how to tack into the wind and tie a rolling hitch. We anchored off uninhabited islands and paddled to shore to hike through lush rainforests and cactus-covered hills. I logged hour upon hour underwater, drunk on compressed air. The sky was always a dizzying blue, and the water was always 80 degrees and clear.

My parents hardly recognized me when I stepped off the plane from the British Virgin Islands, blond, bronzed, and a little tougher. Although less than optimistic, I could almost bear the thought of returning to my sophomore year because I had a clear goal: to become a marine biologist.

For years, when asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, I would smile with confidence and reply, “a marine biologist.” Now, in search of a place where I could shine, I set out in earnest to study marine biology.

My path to success wasn’t obvious because marine biology is not an especially popular or relevant profession in Pittsburgh. I was, however, fortunate to live within walking distance of the city’s aquarium, where I volunteered as an assistant keeper.

During my time scrubbing algae and chopping squid, I also began to understand the fundamental connection between science and the sea. I started to work hard in the same chemistry and physics classes that had previously failed to capture my attention. I believed that good grades in these subjects would be my ticket back to the coast.

As graduation approached, my heretofore amorphous dream at last began to take shape: a bachelor’s degree in biology, five to six years of graduate work to earn a Ph.D. in marine science, two years in a postdoctoral position, and then tenure track. I enrolled at Swarthmore, where I approached my studies with an unwavering intensity. While drowning in work the winter of my junior year, I learned about a foreign-study program in marine biology and ecology in Denmark. I registered the next day for the upcoming spring semester.

In Denmark, a country of 406 islands wedged between the North and Baltic seas, I felt truly alive for the first time since living in the British Virgin Islands. Danes tend to be relaxed and informal, unafraid to slow down. After about a month away from Swarthmore, I slowed down too, buoyed by enchanting Copenhagen and resurfacing dreams. There, I learned about the problems of nutrient dumping in estuarine ecosystems, which I decided to study in graduate school.

After Swarthmore, North Carolina lured me back through an inauspicious fusion of scientific ego and childhood memory. After one year of course work in idyllic Chapel Hill, I moved to UNC’s marine lab in Morehead City—a flat strip town in a region sometimes referred to as the Redneck Riviera—to conduct my research.

But the life of a graduate student in marine science was not what I expected. I rarely went out on the water and certainly wasn’t fighting for the plight of the world’s oceans in any tangible way. Most of my time was spent leafing through journal articles and reorganizing my lab bench. Actual science happened just twice a week, when I ran my experiments using water samples others collected from the Neuse River estuary.

On Tuesdays and Fridays, I would lock myself in a pitch-black room—clad in two layers of rubber gloves, heavy boots, and a white lab jacket. For more than three hours, I bathed the microscopic algae in my water samples (and myself) in treatments of radioactive isotope, hydrochloric acid, and a carcinogenic fixative. I was told that my data, in conjunction with other work being completed in the lab, would be enough for me to tack the letters Ph.D. after my name, if only I would keep at it for a few more years. Ah, the glamorous life of a marine biologist, splashing around with whales and dolphins.

Yes, I was finally a marine scientist. But reality fell far short of the life I had imagined for myself. My dream had run abruptly aground, and I was forced to acknowledge that my passion for the ocean did not mean I was destined to be a marine scientist.

Almost three years have passed since I requested leave from UNC and moved home to Pittsburgh, where I work as a reporter for a local daily paper. I know I won’t be going back. It took 15 years, but I’ve finally learned to treat all new flights of fancy and grand master plans with an appropriate dose of circumspection.

I still love the ocean and wet sand between my toes as I stand in the milky froth at the water’s edge. I love breaking waves as they surge over my body in their inevitable journey toward the shore. I love the feather-like caress of a school of fish, the sharp taste of saltwater, and the sound of my own breath underwater.

So I will forever be dreaming about my next beach vacation.

Jennifer Gross is currently a staff writer at the Valley News Dispatch in Tarentum, Pa.