WEBVTT

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.590 align:middle line:90%
Thanks so much, Tyler.

00:00:01.590 --> 00:00:04.710 align:middle line:90%
Thanks everybody for being here.

00:00:04.710 --> 00:00:06.960 align:middle line:84%
Ander, thanks for the
awesome broadsides.

00:00:06.960 --> 00:00:09.820 align:middle line:90%
Beautiful, just love them.

00:00:09.820 --> 00:00:11.550 align:middle line:84%
So I'm going to
read a few pieces

00:00:11.550 --> 00:00:14.010 align:middle line:90%
from this new collection.

00:00:14.010 --> 00:00:16.950 align:middle line:84%
I'm going to start out
in a pretty dark place,

00:00:16.950 --> 00:00:21.060 align:middle line:84%
but I think if you're talking
about the situation of animals

00:00:21.060 --> 00:00:23.430 align:middle line:84%
on the planet, if you
don't go somewhere dark,

00:00:23.430 --> 00:00:26.610 align:middle line:84%
you got your eyes
closed these days.

00:00:26.610 --> 00:00:30.990 align:middle line:84%
But we'll come out
on the other side

00:00:30.990 --> 00:00:37.870 align:middle line:84%
with a broader range of emotions
touched this evening, I hope.

00:00:37.870 --> 00:00:41.080 align:middle line:84%
I've just come down
from Atlantic Canada.

00:00:41.080 --> 00:00:44.290 align:middle line:84%
I thought I'd read this
piece about a finback whale.

00:00:44.290 --> 00:00:47.350 align:middle line:90%
It'll connect-- in a while--

00:00:47.350 --> 00:00:52.150 align:middle line:84%
with Susan's really interesting
work with the market.

00:00:52.150 --> 00:00:56.970 align:middle line:84%
"The Finback." The finback
whale washed ashore

00:00:56.970 --> 00:01:00.000 align:middle line:84%
on the blond sand
at Herring Cove.

00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:04.680 align:middle line:84%
The research team used knives
and hammers to cut him apart--

00:01:04.680 --> 00:01:08.310 align:middle line:84%
a perfect, black, dorsal
fin lay here on the beach.

00:01:08.310 --> 00:01:11.880 align:middle line:84%
A slab of black skin
lined with fat lay there.

00:01:11.880 --> 00:01:15.000 align:middle line:84%
A pile of dim intestines
rested atop a segment

00:01:15.000 --> 00:01:16.470 align:middle line:90%
of severed spine.

00:01:16.470 --> 00:01:21.000 align:middle line:84%
The flesh was meat red, a red
so deep it seemed black red.

00:01:21.000 --> 00:01:25.530 align:middle line:84%
Long slices of flesh revealed
three inches of white blubber,

00:01:25.530 --> 00:01:29.280 align:middle line:84%
like a thick quilt between
the skin and muscle.

00:01:29.280 --> 00:01:31.920 align:middle line:84%
The animal's
decomposition had stained

00:01:31.920 --> 00:01:34.020 align:middle line:90%
the air all along the beach.

00:01:34.020 --> 00:01:37.260 align:middle line:84%
Some of us who had come
to witness the spectacle

00:01:37.260 --> 00:01:40.680 align:middle line:84%
covered our mouths and
noses with sweater sleeves,

00:01:40.680 --> 00:01:44.520 align:middle line:84%
or lifted sweatshirts
to turn them into masks.

00:01:44.520 --> 00:01:46.920 align:middle line:84%
The park rangers
quietly kept the crowd

00:01:46.920 --> 00:01:50.280 align:middle line:84%
of 20, 30 people at a
distance while the team

00:01:50.280 --> 00:01:53.460 align:middle line:84%
climbed on the carcass,
their polyvinyl rain

00:01:53.460 --> 00:01:56.880 align:middle line:84%
suits smeared with blood
from feet to shoulders.

00:01:56.880 --> 00:01:59.610 align:middle line:84%
One man kneeled on a
bloody bench of meat

00:01:59.610 --> 00:02:02.190 align:middle line:84%
to saw loose some
hunk of the animal.

00:02:02.190 --> 00:02:05.250 align:middle line:84%
The dense, white
organ of its inner ear

00:02:05.250 --> 00:02:07.650 align:middle line:90%
that keeps the whale's balance.

00:02:07.650 --> 00:02:09.870 align:middle line:84%
One woman labored
to pull her hacksaw

00:02:09.870 --> 00:02:11.820 align:middle line:90%
through a vertebral gap.

00:02:11.820 --> 00:02:14.370 align:middle line:84%
They were assisted
by a backhoe, ropes,

00:02:14.370 --> 00:02:18.030 align:middle line:84%
and chains so that the tonnage
they pulled apart piece

00:02:18.030 --> 00:02:21.900 align:middle line:84%
by piece seemed as
light as paper maché.

00:02:21.900 --> 00:02:24.750 align:middle line:84%
One man carried a meat
hook hanging from his hand

00:02:24.750 --> 00:02:26.730 align:middle line:84%
as he stood
watching, another man

00:02:26.730 --> 00:02:29.790 align:middle line:84%
leaned toward the closed
eye and eyeball bigger

00:02:29.790 --> 00:02:31.410 align:middle line:90%
than the man's fist.

00:02:31.410 --> 00:02:34.560 align:middle line:84%
Difficult to see there
was an eyeball there

00:02:34.560 --> 00:02:38.310 align:middle line:84%
between the dull soft
folds of gray flesh.

00:02:38.310 --> 00:02:41.520 align:middle line:84%
The man inserted a
small disposable syringe

00:02:41.520 --> 00:02:45.430 align:middle line:84%
to draw a sample of
the vitreous humor.

00:02:45.430 --> 00:02:48.190 align:middle line:84%
The whale had been spotted
offshore two days earlier,

00:02:48.190 --> 00:02:50.920 align:middle line:84%
already dead, floating,
beginning to break apart

00:02:50.920 --> 00:02:54.610 align:middle line:84%
from decay, its tongue
protruded grotesquely

00:02:54.610 --> 00:02:57.970 align:middle line:84%
like a gigantic balloon
wider in circumference

00:02:57.970 --> 00:02:59.260 align:middle line:90%
than the whale's body.

00:02:59.260 --> 00:03:02.170 align:middle line:84%
It looked unnatural,
that billow of flesh

00:03:02.170 --> 00:03:05.380 align:middle line:84%
puffed up with gas from
the whale's decaying.

00:03:05.380 --> 00:03:09.850 align:middle line:84%
It was horrible, and
everyone wanted to see it.

00:03:09.850 --> 00:03:11.740 align:middle line:84%
The whale's blood
was too far gone

00:03:11.740 --> 00:03:13.600 align:middle line:84%
to further the
science of its death,

00:03:13.600 --> 00:03:15.190 align:middle line:84%
but evidence could
still be drawn

00:03:15.190 --> 00:03:17.050 align:middle line:90%
from the fluid in the eyeball.

00:03:17.050 --> 00:03:19.210 align:middle line:84%
Even this procedure
may have failed,

00:03:19.210 --> 00:03:21.340 align:middle line:84%
as the syringe man
shook his head,

00:03:21.340 --> 00:03:23.860 align:middle line:84%
discouraged after
pulling out the needle.

00:03:23.860 --> 00:03:26.260 align:middle line:84%
He did not bother
to sheath the needle

00:03:26.260 --> 00:03:28.570 align:middle line:84%
and it seemed that even
here, in the sealed

00:03:28.570 --> 00:03:33.220 align:middle line:84%
globe of the Leviathan's eye,
the process of disintegration

00:03:33.220 --> 00:03:36.130 align:middle line:84%
had progressed too far
for much to be learned

00:03:36.130 --> 00:03:38.650 align:middle line:90%
about how the animal had died.

00:03:38.650 --> 00:03:40.450 align:middle line:90%
The stink was horrible.

00:03:40.450 --> 00:03:42.910 align:middle line:84%
It coated a person's
nostrils and throat.

00:03:42.910 --> 00:03:46.180 align:middle line:84%
The smell of life and
death mingled all at once.

00:03:46.180 --> 00:03:51.070 align:middle line:84%
Acrid, rank, and
iron-rich, undeniable.

00:03:51.070 --> 00:03:55.300 align:middle line:84%
The research team, four hours
into their labor of necropsy

00:03:55.300 --> 00:03:57.070 align:middle line:90%
were habituated to the stench.

00:03:57.070 --> 00:03:59.440 align:middle line:84%
Not one covered
her mouth or nose.

00:03:59.440 --> 00:04:02.650 align:middle line:84%
Not one gasped for
breath or turned away.

00:04:02.650 --> 00:04:05.350 align:middle line:84%
Though they bent to
their work inches away

00:04:05.350 --> 00:04:08.540 align:middle line:90%
from the putrefaction.

00:04:08.540 --> 00:04:11.840 align:middle line:84%
The spectacle made me think
of the old whaling days.

00:04:11.840 --> 00:04:15.920 align:middle line:84%
The hard labor of men at sea
harvesting whales and rendering

00:04:15.920 --> 00:04:16.579 align:middle line:90%
blubber--

00:04:16.579 --> 00:04:19.250 align:middle line:84%
the whaling industry's
liquid gold,

00:04:19.250 --> 00:04:24.410 align:middle line:84%
sold to make soap, shampoo,
lipstick, paint, and lamp oil.

00:04:24.410 --> 00:04:26.840 align:middle line:90%
Whale oil made some men wealthy.

00:04:26.840 --> 00:04:30.860 align:middle line:84%
Banknotes from the 1850's
were drawn on the whaling

00:04:30.860 --> 00:04:32.990 align:middle line:90%
bank, or the merchants bank.

00:04:32.990 --> 00:04:36.470 align:middle line:84%
The bills bearing the engraved
image of a sperm whale.

00:04:36.470 --> 00:04:38.750 align:middle line:90%
Whaling made some men free.

00:04:38.750 --> 00:04:43.690 align:middle line:84%
An escaped slave could not be
arrested from a whale ship.

00:04:43.690 --> 00:04:46.650 align:middle line:90%
Whaling made some men citizens.

00:04:46.650 --> 00:04:50.010 align:middle line:84%
The industry brought
immigrants from the Azores,

00:04:50.010 --> 00:04:52.110 align:middle line:90%
who knew the sea and boats.

00:04:52.110 --> 00:04:56.610 align:middle line:84%
They landed in New Bedford
and never went home.

00:04:56.610 --> 00:05:00.600 align:middle line:84%
After a maniacal century or
two for the Dutch, English,

00:05:00.600 --> 00:05:04.650 align:middle line:84%
and French, the Americans
took dominance in the trade.

00:05:04.650 --> 00:05:07.950 align:middle line:84%
Whale ships dotted the
Pacific like whitecaps,

00:05:07.950 --> 00:05:11.340 align:middle line:84%
as men hunted the
diminishing stock, then moved

00:05:11.340 --> 00:05:14.280 align:middle line:84%
north for bow heads
and their baleen,

00:05:14.280 --> 00:05:18.150 align:middle line:84%
harvested as a plastic
material before plastics,

00:05:18.150 --> 00:05:21.690 align:middle line:84%
for corset and collar
stays, for umbrella ribs.

00:05:21.690 --> 00:05:26.270 align:middle line:90%


00:05:26.270 --> 00:05:29.060 align:middle line:84%
Thinking like this made
me feel the comfort

00:05:29.060 --> 00:05:33.350 align:middle line:84%
that the animals brought to
people through those products.

00:05:33.350 --> 00:05:36.500 align:middle line:84%
Comfort welcome in
their dark homes,

00:05:36.500 --> 00:05:40.640 align:middle line:84%
at a time when no one could have
known that such abundance would

00:05:40.640 --> 00:05:41.900 align:middle line:90%
cease.

00:05:41.900 --> 00:05:44.180 align:middle line:90%
Endangerment was not a threat--

00:05:44.180 --> 00:05:46.940 align:middle line:90%
was a threat no one had seen.

00:05:46.940 --> 00:05:48.740 align:middle line:90%
Am I too kind?

00:05:48.740 --> 00:05:52.910 align:middle line:84%
Had people not already seen the
slaughter of the bison herds,

00:05:52.910 --> 00:05:56.930 align:middle line:84%
pelts piled up like
raked autumn leaves?

00:05:56.930 --> 00:06:02.780 align:middle line:84%
Still, the hardship and heroism
can make one blind to victims,

00:06:02.780 --> 00:06:05.570 align:middle line:84%
can make one think of
those difficult years

00:06:05.570 --> 00:06:08.780 align:middle line:84%
at sea, three to four
years at a stretch,

00:06:08.780 --> 00:06:12.440 align:middle line:84%
searching the oceans
for the 20 or so whales

00:06:12.440 --> 00:06:17.930 align:middle line:84%
a ship would capture and render
into oil before sailing home.

00:06:17.930 --> 00:06:23.420 align:middle line:84%
Work done by hand, and oar,
and blade, the reek, and blood,

00:06:23.420 --> 00:06:26.240 align:middle line:90%
and grease coating everything.

00:06:26.240 --> 00:06:31.760 align:middle line:84%
The brutality taken on
with courage and prayer.

00:06:31.760 --> 00:06:34.520 align:middle line:84%
The finback's upper jaw
was released from the body,

00:06:34.520 --> 00:06:37.100 align:middle line:84%
and the backhoe
hoisted it and swung it

00:06:37.100 --> 00:06:39.740 align:middle line:90%
to a clean, dry stretch of sand.

00:06:39.740 --> 00:06:43.610 align:middle line:84%
The baleen shone like a halo--
a partial halo, at least,

00:06:43.610 --> 00:06:45.410 align:middle line:90%
rimming the upper jaw.

00:06:45.410 --> 00:06:48.350 align:middle line:84%
Dark cuticle grew from
the gums and splintered

00:06:48.350 --> 00:06:52.310 align:middle line:84%
into golden bristles that
took the place of teeth.

00:06:52.310 --> 00:06:54.920 align:middle line:84%
Monstrous gulps of
seawater had been

00:06:54.920 --> 00:06:57.050 align:middle line:90%
squeezed through the bristles.

00:06:57.050 --> 00:07:00.530 align:middle line:84%
At least a ton of minuscule
krill and copepods

00:07:00.530 --> 00:07:04.550 align:middle line:84%
filtering into the finback's
great belly every day.

00:07:04.550 --> 00:07:09.380 align:middle line:84%
Details whispered up from
the ranger, or the looker-on.

00:07:09.380 --> 00:07:12.710 align:middle line:84%
The whale was a juvenile,
maybe five or six years old,

00:07:12.710 --> 00:07:14.510 align:middle line:90%
about 40 feet long.

00:07:14.510 --> 00:07:17.630 align:middle line:84%
No visible signs of injury,
though for an animal

00:07:17.630 --> 00:07:21.680 align:middle line:84%
that might live 90 to 100
years, such an early death

00:07:21.680 --> 00:07:23.540 align:middle line:90%
raised questions.

00:07:23.540 --> 00:07:26.150 align:middle line:84%
Its endangered status
makes every loss

00:07:26.150 --> 00:07:29.420 align:middle line:84%
a cause for concern
and investigation.

00:07:29.420 --> 00:07:33.740 align:middle line:84%
Quietness of the scene, the
intensity of the team's focus

00:07:33.740 --> 00:07:38.360 align:middle line:84%
while handling the dead
whale was a form of devotion,

00:07:38.360 --> 00:07:41.270 align:middle line:84%
and iteration of
the archaic human

00:07:41.270 --> 00:07:46.150 align:middle line:84%
wish to let no
death go unmarked.

00:07:46.150 --> 00:07:49.960 align:middle line:84%
The animal was sanctified
by human touch and caring,

00:07:49.960 --> 00:07:51.940 align:middle line:84%
though those words
were not likely to be

00:07:51.940 --> 00:07:54.070 align:middle line:90%
noted in the research protocol.

00:07:54.070 --> 00:07:57.910 align:middle line:84%
Science has a method for feeling
its way through the world's

00:07:57.910 --> 00:08:00.130 align:middle line:90%
wounds and trauma.

00:08:00.130 --> 00:08:01.690 align:middle line:90%
And why had we come?

00:08:01.690 --> 00:08:03.760 align:middle line:84%
All of us in town
that day who had

00:08:03.760 --> 00:08:06.700 align:middle line:84%
been planning to take a
walk, or have a picnic,

00:08:06.700 --> 00:08:08.950 align:middle line:84%
the gardeners who
planned to till the dirt,

00:08:08.950 --> 00:08:12.100 align:middle line:84%
and the writers who planned to
face their desks, why had we

00:08:12.100 --> 00:08:12.880 align:middle line:90%
come?

00:08:12.880 --> 00:08:15.430 align:middle line:84%
Those of us who heard
the news on the radio,

00:08:15.430 --> 00:08:19.000 align:middle line:84%
or from a neighbor, and wanted
to see the horrible whale?

00:08:19.000 --> 00:08:21.310 align:middle line:84%
Why did parents
bring their children,

00:08:21.310 --> 00:08:24.880 align:middle line:84%
or the old man wearing
his veteran's colors

00:08:24.880 --> 00:08:27.880 align:middle line:84%
who could not walk the
distance from parking lot

00:08:27.880 --> 00:08:31.780 align:middle line:84%
to stranding site, why
did he stand at a distance

00:08:31.780 --> 00:08:35.409 align:middle line:90%
and ask passers-by for details?

00:08:35.409 --> 00:08:38.679 align:middle line:84%
What are they using to
cut that thing apart?

00:08:38.679 --> 00:08:41.289 align:middle line:84%
Surely, we all wanted to
see the thing up close,

00:08:41.289 --> 00:08:42.730 align:middle line:90%
to see it whole.

00:08:42.730 --> 00:08:45.820 align:middle line:84%
An animal like that
we're lucky ever

00:08:45.820 --> 00:08:48.730 align:middle line:84%
to glimpse as it passes
a whale watch boat

00:08:48.730 --> 00:08:50.920 align:middle line:84%
and turns its
massive contemplative

00:08:50.920 --> 00:08:55.750 align:middle line:84%
eye upon our vessel, then
steaming forward and down,

00:08:55.750 --> 00:08:58.780 align:middle line:90%
flukes flicking up as it dives.

00:08:58.780 --> 00:09:01.660 align:middle line:84%
The finback is as
sleek as a greyhound,

00:09:01.660 --> 00:09:07.590 align:middle line:84%
elegant as a little black
dress, and swift as a cormorant.

00:09:07.590 --> 00:09:10.080 align:middle line:84%
For two weeks, I've been
writing about animals

00:09:10.080 --> 00:09:12.910 align:middle line:90%
in my Provincetown studio.

00:09:12.910 --> 00:09:15.250 align:middle line:84%
Why have I been writing
so many dark stories?

00:09:15.250 --> 00:09:19.150 align:middle line:84%
I asked myself, when I
wanted to write about love?

00:09:19.150 --> 00:09:21.040 align:middle line:84%
I've written about
murdering a rat,

00:09:21.040 --> 00:09:25.030 align:middle line:84%
and harvesting a pig, about
anthropogenic Pleistocene

00:09:25.030 --> 00:09:27.370 align:middle line:84%
extinctions, and
the surplus killing

00:09:27.370 --> 00:09:29.770 align:middle line:90%
behavior of spotted hyenas.

00:09:29.770 --> 00:09:33.640 align:middle line:84%
Hardly the stuff of the
Friends of Heart animal gift

00:09:33.640 --> 00:09:35.920 align:middle line:84%
store I've walked
past on Commercial

00:09:35.920 --> 00:09:38.290 align:middle line:84%
Street with its doggy
pillows and kitty

00:09:38.290 --> 00:09:41.890 align:middle line:84%
throws, bellies up
ceramic chihuahuas

00:09:41.890 --> 00:09:44.860 align:middle line:84%
wearing rhinestone
collars, and tabbies

00:09:44.860 --> 00:09:47.620 align:middle line:84%
sprouting angelic
wings, each bit

00:09:47.620 --> 00:09:51.730 align:middle line:84%
of cloying kitsch celebrating
the sweetness that animals

00:09:51.730 --> 00:09:54.290 align:middle line:90%
provide in people's homes.

00:09:54.290 --> 00:09:57.100 align:middle line:84%
But I avoided all
the salt water taffy,

00:09:57.100 --> 00:10:00.430 align:middle line:84%
heading without clear
purpose into the sorrowful,

00:10:00.430 --> 00:10:05.290 align:middle line:84%
and bitter, and now down
into rank purification.

00:10:05.290 --> 00:10:08.110 align:middle line:84%
Perhaps, I'm like
the drunk who needs

00:10:08.110 --> 00:10:12.340 align:middle line:84%
to hit bottom before turning
the trajectory from freefall

00:10:12.340 --> 00:10:13.960 align:middle line:90%
to recovery.

00:10:13.960 --> 00:10:15.760 align:middle line:84%
Perhaps I'm like
the moviegoer who

00:10:15.760 --> 00:10:18.670 align:middle line:84%
likes to watch the
apocalypse happen again

00:10:18.670 --> 00:10:22.090 align:middle line:84%
and again, car after
car, city after city,

00:10:22.090 --> 00:10:25.210 align:middle line:84%
overturned and destroyed,
preparing the ground

00:10:25.210 --> 00:10:28.950 align:middle line:84%
for the happy ending
of symphonic love.

00:10:28.950 --> 00:10:31.410 align:middle line:84%
Perhaps I want to pay
respect to the dead.

00:10:31.410 --> 00:10:33.720 align:middle line:84%
To attend the viewing
of the corpse,

00:10:33.720 --> 00:10:37.470 align:middle line:84%
a practice that my pragmatic
and agnostic relatives

00:10:37.470 --> 00:10:39.780 align:middle line:84%
have long abandoned
for the sake of

00:10:39.780 --> 00:10:43.140 align:middle line:90%
tidy and practical cremation.

00:10:43.140 --> 00:10:45.690 align:middle line:84%
Perhaps something in
me knows that if I

00:10:45.690 --> 00:10:49.440 align:middle line:84%
can't stand the sight
of what disgusts me,

00:10:49.440 --> 00:10:52.110 align:middle line:84%
I haven't the strength
to love anything

00:10:52.110 --> 00:10:54.600 align:middle line:90%
in this difficult world.

00:10:54.600 --> 00:10:56.970 align:middle line:84%
Perhaps I have an
appetite for suffering.

00:10:56.970 --> 00:11:02.470 align:middle line:84%
Something in me that likes
to be tested by empathy.

00:11:02.470 --> 00:11:06.100 align:middle line:84%
"It is impossible to know
war," writes Chris Hedges

00:11:06.100 --> 00:11:09.010 align:middle line:84%
in a New York Times Book
Review, "if you do not

00:11:09.010 --> 00:11:14.390 align:middle line:84%
stand with the mass of the
powerless caught in its maw."

00:11:14.390 --> 00:11:16.880 align:middle line:84%
This finback is
no victim of war,

00:11:16.880 --> 00:11:21.680 align:middle line:84%
unless I call the undeclared and
unremitting assault on Earth's

00:11:21.680 --> 00:11:24.640 align:middle line:90%
bounty a form of war.

00:11:24.640 --> 00:11:26.680 align:middle line:84%
By this logic,
it's fair to claim

00:11:26.680 --> 00:11:29.800 align:middle line:84%
that for centuries,
our ancestors waged war

00:11:29.800 --> 00:11:33.460 align:middle line:84%
against cetaceans in
order to gain their oil.

00:11:33.460 --> 00:11:35.740 align:middle line:84%
And that war, like
the recent ones

00:11:35.740 --> 00:11:39.430 align:middle line:84%
fought in Iraq and elsewhere,
renders certain merchants

00:11:39.430 --> 00:11:43.390 align:middle line:84%
wealthy, while the mass of
citizens living in war zones

00:11:43.390 --> 00:11:47.260 align:middle line:84%
suffer nothing but
destruction and chaos.

00:11:47.260 --> 00:11:51.160 align:middle line:84%
Imagine, a whale that
has lived 100 years.

00:11:51.160 --> 00:11:55.450 align:middle line:84%
It carries a body of experience
that includes assault

00:11:55.450 --> 00:12:00.760 align:middle line:84%
by spears, carnage of its clan
members, the terror of battle,

00:12:00.760 --> 00:12:03.730 align:middle line:84%
the bloody silt of
death drifting slowly

00:12:03.730 --> 00:12:07.660 align:middle line:84%
down from the water's surface,
as sunlight will do underwater,

00:12:07.660 --> 00:12:12.100 align:middle line:84%
making a ghostly light that
dissipates as it reaches deeper

00:12:12.100 --> 00:12:14.790 align:middle line:90%
into the ocean's enormity.

00:12:14.790 --> 00:12:18.060 align:middle line:84%
Sometimes, a survivor
carries the assault weapon

00:12:18.060 --> 00:12:22.740 align:middle line:84%
like a combat veteran with
shrapnel lodged in his neck.

00:12:22.740 --> 00:12:26.610 align:middle line:84%
Late in the 1800s,
innovators in the trade

00:12:26.610 --> 00:12:29.310 align:middle line:84%
developed an explosive
device whalers

00:12:29.310 --> 00:12:31.920 align:middle line:90%
fitted to the tip of a harpoon.

00:12:31.920 --> 00:12:35.850 align:middle line:84%
100 years later, a
bowhead whale carcass

00:12:35.850 --> 00:12:39.360 align:middle line:84%
was found with this device,
absorbed in its flesh,

00:12:39.360 --> 00:12:44.370 align:middle line:84%
like a tree that swallows a
bullet, or kink of barbed wire,

00:12:44.370 --> 00:12:47.460 align:middle line:90%
as it grows.

00:12:47.460 --> 00:12:49.260 align:middle line:84%
I recently dreamed
of a woman who

00:12:49.260 --> 00:12:53.280 align:middle line:84%
was holding a cougar, a
cougar kitten in her arms,

00:12:53.280 --> 00:12:55.890 align:middle line:84%
its head resting
beside her cheek,

00:12:55.890 --> 00:12:59.880 align:middle line:84%
as a mother would carry
and comfort a human baby

00:12:59.880 --> 00:13:02.100 align:middle line:90%
with unbridled tenderness.

00:13:02.100 --> 00:13:05.640 align:middle line:84%
She was a no-nonsense woman with
close cropped hair and khaki

00:13:05.640 --> 00:13:08.130 align:middle line:84%
clothes, the kind of woman who
might show up on television

00:13:08.130 --> 00:13:11.460 align:middle line:84%
to introduce zoo animals
to a population starving

00:13:11.460 --> 00:13:13.260 align:middle line:90%
for animal beauty.

00:13:13.260 --> 00:13:16.560 align:middle line:84%
In the dream, a group of friends
or colleagues were in the room,

00:13:16.560 --> 00:13:19.200 align:middle line:84%
some were surprised to see
a cougar in their midst.

00:13:19.200 --> 00:13:20.430 align:middle line:90%
Another said, "Oh, yes.

00:13:20.430 --> 00:13:23.152 align:middle line:84%
They walk through this
yard all the time."

00:13:23.152 --> 00:13:24.360 align:middle line:90%
Another replied, "Well, sure.

00:13:24.360 --> 00:13:26.550 align:middle line:84%
But you know,
they're endangered."

00:13:26.550 --> 00:13:28.920 align:middle line:84%
The woman cuddling
the cougar said,

00:13:28.920 --> 00:13:31.980 align:middle line:84%
"I don't think I will miss
them when they were gone."

00:13:31.980 --> 00:13:34.890 align:middle line:84%
The dissonance between
her actions and her words

00:13:34.890 --> 00:13:36.840 align:middle line:90%
woke me from the dream.

00:13:36.840 --> 00:13:39.360 align:middle line:84%
I wasn't angry at
her, and I did not

00:13:39.360 --> 00:13:41.370 align:middle line:90%
judge her for the statement.

00:13:41.370 --> 00:13:45.510 align:middle line:84%
I knew her life was full of many
concerns that took precedence

00:13:45.510 --> 00:13:50.440 align:middle line:84%
over imagining such a
loss and holding it close.

00:13:50.440 --> 00:13:53.260 align:middle line:84%
The cheetahs are gone
from North America.

00:13:53.260 --> 00:13:56.800 align:middle line:84%
The jaguars are nearly
gone, except in Mexico.

00:13:56.800 --> 00:13:58.840 align:middle line:90%
The American Lions are gone.

00:13:58.840 --> 00:14:01.810 align:middle line:84%
And while cougars are thriving
in some regions of the United

00:14:01.810 --> 00:14:04.090 align:middle line:84%
States, their
increasing interaction

00:14:04.090 --> 00:14:08.620 align:middle line:84%
with human populations makes
them increasingly vulnerable.

00:14:08.620 --> 00:14:13.030 align:middle line:84%
The whales still have
the seas and the pleasure

00:14:13.030 --> 00:14:15.250 align:middle line:84%
of their graceful
rising and diving

00:14:15.250 --> 00:14:17.980 align:middle line:84%
in the continual
embrace of water.

00:14:17.980 --> 00:14:20.140 align:middle line:84%
But their numbers
are diminished.

00:14:20.140 --> 00:14:22.210 align:middle line:90%
Their habitat is defiled.

00:14:22.210 --> 00:14:26.020 align:middle line:84%
Their prey is dwindling, and
some of their own species

00:14:26.020 --> 00:14:29.020 align:middle line:90%
are going, and will not return.

00:14:29.020 --> 00:14:34.750 align:middle line:84%
Those that remain glide through
an impoverished homeland.

00:14:34.750 --> 00:14:38.530 align:middle line:84%
Animals with brains
inclined, as with elephants

00:14:38.530 --> 00:14:42.260 align:middle line:84%
and human beings,
toward community.

00:14:42.260 --> 00:14:46.670 align:middle line:84%
How quiet the deep ocean must
have grown for the whales

00:14:46.670 --> 00:14:49.640 align:middle line:84%
since the time of their
greatest abundance.

00:14:49.640 --> 00:14:53.360 align:middle line:84%
Animals who sent sonic
messages hundreds of miles

00:14:53.360 --> 00:14:57.070 align:middle line:84%
through the deep to
connect with their kind.

00:14:57.070 --> 00:15:00.470 align:middle line:84%
How those cetacean
messages meet one another,

00:15:00.470 --> 00:15:03.040 align:middle line:84%
how they register in
the bodies of whales

00:15:03.040 --> 00:15:08.230 align:middle line:84%
as music registers in our bodies
is a mystery and a marvel.

00:15:08.230 --> 00:15:11.410 align:middle line:84%
Do they feel a sense
of intangible nostalgia

00:15:11.410 --> 00:15:14.980 align:middle line:84%
for a past they intuit
was somehow richer

00:15:14.980 --> 00:15:17.750 align:middle line:90%
than the present they know?

00:15:17.750 --> 00:15:22.190 align:middle line:84%
What does desire feel
like in a cetacean body?

00:15:22.190 --> 00:15:25.220 align:middle line:84%
Arousal quickening
out of nowhere,

00:15:25.220 --> 00:15:29.510 align:middle line:84%
as their flesh glides
down through cathedrals

00:15:29.510 --> 00:15:34.300 align:middle line:84%
of light and shadow
into the solemn depths.

00:15:34.300 --> 00:15:35.254 align:middle line:90%