Who saw what I saw on my doorstep today?
August 16th 2008 07:30
It’s whale season where I live and for the past few months everyone and I mean bloody everyone has seen whales – five of them at a time, frolicking, jumping, twisting, spouting – except me. I look for whales every day when I go for my run. I talk to the sea. But … nothing. I’ve taken it a little personally, like maybe I’m not doing enough work on myself spiritually, or I should recycle more consciously and switch to organic products.
I am so very fond of whales. My first encounter with these massive sea mammals happened just a few days before my son’s birth. I was enormously pregnant and so weary with the pregnancy that had been a battle from the beginning, starting with pneumonia at 11 weeks, and cortisone throughout, with various bouts in which I just couldn’t breathe. This also meant I hadn’t been able to exercise at all in nine months. I was exhausted and wanted this baby out. Emotionally I’d come through a difficult period in which I wondered whether it was a good idea to be bringing children into the world at all.
I had driven to see a special body therapist, and was early for my appointment, so I made my way down to the beach. I walked slowly down the beach, moving in my enormous aching body, step by weary step. Suddenly, it felt like everything went quiet. I looked out to sea.
And then a whale burst full out the water, and twisted in the air, before diving back into the ocean.
I looked around to see if anyone else had seen what I had seen, but I was all alone on the beach. Of course I was convinced it had jumped ‘JUST FOR ME’ – oh the vanity of it all … But in that moment something in me came to a stillness. All the anxiety and tension and fear and pain I had been carrying in me, left my body. It was as if the whale restored the hope I needed to me so that I could birth my child.
What I love about whales is how everyone stops, pauses, focuses on the ‘out there,’ waiting, hoping, ‘show us you’re here…’ People, usually frenetic and destination-oriented, become patient. A silence descends. I feel part of a collective of humanity. I actually feel as if I am in touch with that universal love for all things that live.
Whales give us a moment of exquisite peace.
Today, in Coogee Bay, twenty-five metres off shore, a whale spent most of the morning. We went down to the beach to watch. She was there for so long, people thought perhaps she was calving or couldn’t find her way out of the bay (as if…) But for several hours, the whole of Coogee came down to the shore. To wait and watch. To bask in the blessing of the whales’ visit.
Did anyone else see this glorious creature today?
www.joannefedler.com
I am so very fond of whales. My first encounter with these massive sea mammals happened just a few days before my son’s birth. I was enormously pregnant and so weary with the pregnancy that had been a battle from the beginning, starting with pneumonia at 11 weeks, and cortisone throughout, with various bouts in which I just couldn’t breathe. This also meant I hadn’t been able to exercise at all in nine months. I was exhausted and wanted this baby out. Emotionally I’d come through a difficult period in which I wondered whether it was a good idea to be bringing children into the world at all.
I had driven to see a special body therapist, and was early for my appointment, so I made my way down to the beach. I walked slowly down the beach, moving in my enormous aching body, step by weary step. Suddenly, it felt like everything went quiet. I looked out to sea.
And then a whale burst full out the water, and twisted in the air, before diving back into the ocean.
I looked around to see if anyone else had seen what I had seen, but I was all alone on the beach. Of course I was convinced it had jumped ‘JUST FOR ME’ – oh the vanity of it all … But in that moment something in me came to a stillness. All the anxiety and tension and fear and pain I had been carrying in me, left my body. It was as if the whale restored the hope I needed to me so that I could birth my child.
What I love about whales is how everyone stops, pauses, focuses on the ‘out there,’ waiting, hoping, ‘show us you’re here…’ People, usually frenetic and destination-oriented, become patient. A silence descends. I feel part of a collective of humanity. I actually feel as if I am in touch with that universal love for all things that live.
Whales give us a moment of exquisite peace.
Today, in Coogee Bay, twenty-five metres off shore, a whale spent most of the morning. We went down to the beach to watch. She was there for so long, people thought perhaps she was calving or couldn’t find her way out of the bay (as if…) But for several hours, the whole of Coogee came down to the shore. To wait and watch. To bask in the blessing of the whales’ visit.
Did anyone else see this glorious creature today?
www.joannefedler.com
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If you'll excuse me, I'll have to run down to Coogee...