Picture this: it’s a Monday, you awake with your regular millennial dread and a strange conviction that you, and only you, could totally outwit the ocean with a $30 Amazon rowboat, one weird buoyancy hack at a time. You remember that viral scene where Jack Sparrow yanks a capsized boat over his head and shuffle-walks across the ocean floor like Poseidon’s unlicensed nephew? Naturally, you think: “Could I, a person who can’t commit to a single brand of oat milk, also walk underwater like a pirate legend?” Science, that spoilsport, has Words about this. Your third grade teacher said, “Steel sinks, Styrofoam floats, and if you try to paddle a flamingo pool float into the Mariana Trench, you deserve whatever aquatic justice comes at you.” But I, your resident bedraggled finance blogger, say: let’s get weird with it. Let’s stuff physics in a duffel bag and see how far down we can sink before the WiFi cuts out. Let’s begin with The Law of Buoyancy, or as I call it: “Why Billionaire Yachts Don’t Launch Into Space Mid-Regatta.” The whole vibe is: Water hates being crowded. If you put something heavy in water, water fights back because that’s what bullies do. Steel brick? Sinks, seeks therapy. Styrofoam? Floats, leaves smug Yelp review because it ‘felt light and airy’. But what about an Actual Cube of Water? If, through science or a niche Etsy seller, you somehow hold a cube of pure, uncontained water, it’s not going anywhere—it just exists, like an unbothered Instagram influencer in a sea of #sponsored posts. Boats, however, are not cubes. They’re stubborn, insurance-premium-raising slices of creative accounting, designed to **not** let their steel bits touch the sea bottom and join AtlantisCoin. Modern ships are like massive DIY craft projects: steel on the outside, air on the inside, and a captain who played too much Dungeons & Dragons as a child. That’s why an aircraft carrier—technically a floating barge full of unfulfilled navy TikTokers—floats! The physics say: as long as you displace a Titanic amount of water, the universe is cool with your nautical shenanigans. But the second you load it with 80,000 tons of NFTs or, say, gold-plated avocado toast, it starts to sink toward something called ‘neutral buoyancy’—financially and literally. That’s when the ship and the water are locked in an eternal game of seesaw, neither side winning, but the water always holding a grudge. Now, back to you, jackbooted pirate-in-training, trying to stride gloriously along the seafloor. If you upturn a rowboat and try to walk under it, you’re basically inventing an underwater panic room. The air keeps wanting to yeet itself to the surface while the boat becomes one with nature. You? You’re somewhere in between, desperately Google-searching “can you mortgage a soul for swim lessons.” Let’s not forget: we humans are big bags of slightly salty water (60% water, 40% crippling student debt). That’s why we almost float if we exhale, almost sink if we eat Chipotle, and absolutely panic when a seaweed tentacle brushes our foot. Unless you’re denser than water—which, emotionally, you might well be—neutral buoyancy is your birthright. Go forth and tread awkwardly! So, could you walk the seafloor like Jack Sparrow? Yes...if you have the right hat and nothing left to lose. But mostly, you’ll discover that buoyancy, like rent, cannot be escaped—but it *can* be memed about, and in the end, isn’t that what truly matters?