18—Seals of Approval

To: Friends and Family

Subject: Seals of Approval

From: walden@intermind.net

With this first week of the last year of this millennium, we've also got sun. The price for fair skies in the rainy season is cold. But I’ve got fire!—so have been using the spotting scope in my house to get know my neighbors, the Pacific Harbor Seals. Every day, between 40 to 80 of them haul out at low tide on the sandy spit across from my house not far from the mouth of the bay. Here they lie in all kinds of weather—lookin' like bombs that just ain't gonna study war no more.

Netarts Bay is only about 3.5 square miles and narrow, which means I've got a great view from where I am, right there across from the sandy beach at the edge of the wooded area on the spit.

netartsbaytoday.org

In just several days, I’ve come to recognize the regulars. Hydrogen is a rotund black fellow with white markings like hippie flowers. Always next to Hydrogen is Oxygen, small and white with big dreamy eyes. Buddha, a large buff creature, gazes into the sun even when there is no sun. And Sartre is a huge mottled animal with three chins and slightly crossed eyes that look neither here nor there. Lao-tzu is black with white circles like spectacles around the eyes and the white whiskers of a sage. Little Mohawk is white with a gray streak from head to hindflippers. And Buster is gray and annoys others by always trying to nudge its way into the middle of the herd. Cranberry is white with dark red markings and the sweetest seal face you could imagine. I refer to those who blend into the herd as The Chorus.

Seals should not be confused with sea lions, whose flippers are more pronounced. Seals are more streamlined and can scoot rapidly using the muscular action of their bellies to undulate across the sand. Seals are members of the order Pinnipedia, meaning “winged feet.” They grow to five or six feet, can weigh as much as three hundred pounds, and divide their time between sand and water. They can dive to 1500 feet, can stay under water for as long as forty minutes, and even sleep in the water.

EnchantedLearning.com

As the tide goes out, they don't swim onto the beach. They just begin to appear, their backs at first seeming to be big boulders. Then they arch their backs so that their heads and tails are raised, giving the appearance of a miniature fleet of Viking ships. What I find most fascinating is the way they line up, knowing before the water goes exactly where where the edge will be. When the water recedes, their markings and personalities begin to emerge.

As the tide rises, they arch their backs, heads and tail flippers up. Again, they don’t swim away, but wait for the water to lift them, surrendering at last to the ocean. The last thing you see is the hindflippers, two lotus prayer hands, disappearing into the deep.

Yesterday I drove an hour north to the Seaside Aquarium where I got within a foot of the seals, with only a metal enclosure between us. 

dailyastorian.com

If you're willing to get wet, the aquarium sells small baggies of raw smelt for a dollar. At the first sight of a tourist with a baggie, the seals stop swimming, rush to the edge of their wire enclosure, and go into performance mode. 

My favorite was Fran who gets the attention of visitors by standing up and raising a flipper like an over-achieving grade schooler. Brandy, one of the seal's keepers says Fran is by far the brightest, always testing and playing tricks on new keepers. Fran’s biggest competitors for smelt are the seal who fakes a wounded flipper to garner sympathy, one who slaps its chest, and another who sticks out her tongue. But the competition is wet and keen with all sorts of barking and slapping of flippers.

Brandy said the seal personalities would probably be the same in the wild. Their behavior would simply take different forms to accommodate the environment. While I feel grateful for the opportunity of experiencing these wild animals up close and personal, it’s difficult to set aside the grief surrounding conditions that made it impossible to release them back into their natural habitat. 

But how about many of us humans are where we belong—the place, the job, the relationships, the culture that allow us to live in keeping with our nature? 

On my way home, I stopped at the grocery store and noticed how even in brief interactions with people, the persona emerges. Not a bad thing. Just a fact that I notice here in my solitude where there's no need to perform. 
Interesting thing, the persona, perhaps the most complex evolutionary trait of civilization. 
Are self-help books really about the self or the more successful cultivation of the persona?

Turning onto Crab Avenue in Netarts, I found Lugs lying in the middle of the road as he does everyday after the post office closes at 2 p.m. He seems to know if it's safe to stay put and allowing the car to drive around him—or if he should amble or scamper to the side. 

We humans know things too. How often do we allow what we know to be untrue to run us down?

Next: Whale Watching