last week, my boss shared a story with me about her colleague. this person loves to kayak, and couldn’t for a long time because of a leg injury. recently, she returned to the water. on her first trip back out, she was panic-stricken, shaking, to the point that her instructor almost made her get out. give me a minute, she told him. she collected herself. as she embarked, a seal appeared in the ocean in front of the boat. this was unprecedented, she was encouraged.
this story of course called to mind (and HEART) Undrowned, Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals by Dr. Alexis Pauline Gumbs. i had to pause many times while reading this book, to breathe, to exclaim, or to send someone a passage. the kick of it, the truth. About the Weddell seal, Dr. Gumbs writes:
he will dive 2,600 feet down and use the Earth itself, a magnetic field of resonance, to find the one small hole he made to breathe. Do you not hear that? And you think he’s not tracking you back, tracker? Listen. Just listen. He heats the air around him as he breathes it. What do you think they call him where he’s from? You say his mouth curved up with broken teeth looks like he’s smiling at you. And why? When Weddell was a murderer who came to kill his ancestors, which means you are calling him out of his name. Smile at you? When you now say he is abundant enough to kill “experimentally” while you melt the entire place he lives. You live here too. (Undrowned, 48)
the heat. yesterday, we hiked up to a fire lookout tower in Tuolome County. we didn’t think we would be able to go up at first because the gate was closed. then Terry, the lookout, called out to us and invited us up. he told us about inversion layers, burn windows, that he fishes every evening.
i asked him about the bright blue milk crate on the tower’s balcony, is that how you get your lunch? it’s for everything, he answered. walking up all those stairs with handrails is one thing, but one time i tried walking up carrying a bunch of stuff and when i got to the top i was breathing like a seal.
i was moved by Terry’s invention. to avail himself of focus and grip, no juggling necessary. these little gestures of care. take it from someone who would rather risk dropping something than make multiple trips.
tonight it’s 70 degrees in oakland, after dark, in june. and i’m present to the hubris/contempt that makes us think we can avoid learning to breathe like seals. it’s fire season, again. the airborne virus rages on. so many violences halting our breath, temporarily or irreversibly. we need a lot of Terrys.
i’m aiming for breath that can afford song.
like the seals.