Live Life

Below: A photo of a purple starfish I took with the tide coming in at Lime Kiln Lighthouse last Thursday. I really like how it turned out. All the photos in this blog were taken by me at some point in the last few weeks around the island.

This past week has given me a lot of time for personal reflection. I guess sometimes it takes a bit of tragedy to make you look at things in perspective. My landlord’s wife, Katherine, died of ovarian cancer last Saturday after a three year battle. I wasn’t particularly close with Katherine, but I saw Rob every day and couldn’t help but feel for the family. Katherine was 54 years old when she died… much too young. Her age is what hit me the hardest because my dad is only two years younger than her. I couldn’t help but think the worst… like what if something happened while I’m living so far from home? I suppose death makes people evaluate life. What’s important? Who do you love? Are you living how you should? One thing about life is sure: it doesn’t last forever. We get a brief moment in time, a flash of a firefly, to connect with people and figure out who we are before we are no more. I’m not trying to be pessimistic because there is hope. I learned that every day is a gift, an opportunity to do something great. Never go to sleep mad, because you aren’t guaranteed to wake up. Tell the people you love that you love them. Don’t sweat the small stuff… in the end they don’t mean anything. Don’t be judgmental; it’s not your job to judge others, but to help them. Sometimes we get so stuck in a routine that we fail to notice what’s important. My prayers are with Rob and his family and hopefully Katherine is in a better place.

I’ve been hanging out more frequently with young people from other companies and a group who Mike introduced me to: Adam, Jean, and Cindy (in boat below left). The three of them work for “the man” counting marbled murrelets, a threatened species of bird here. The purpose for this census is to count all birds within a certain area so if there is an oil spill, which there is a good chance of, we would know what we lost. Sad, but true. They’re not like the people I generally hang out with, but that’s what I like about them. They’re different and it’s refreshing to get a different perspective on things by associating with different groups. We also got a new roommate, Sarah. She’s from Bellingham and is finishing up her job as a librarian before she starts work this Sunday. She seems very sweet and is probably my complete opposite! Hahaha. However different isn’t a bad thing; it’s just that: different. I actually think it will be a good thing because I don’t think she’ll see me as any sort of competition. Sometimes the more alike people are, the more some feel the need to compete for attention. The way I see it, people are going to like you for you and you shouldn’t have to go out of your way to get attention. So many girls get caught up in needing attention, but I’ve found the less you look for attention, the more attention you end up getting. I think Sarah and I will get along just fine and I’m really excited about the rest of the summer and meeting the other SJS girls.

This Tuesday and Wednesday were my favorite whale watch trips of the season. The Tuesday trip was great because we took off later than usual, to accommodate a high school band trip, and the orca were quite far from us in Point Roberts. The trip took about 1.5 hours to get to them, but once we got there the other whale watch boats were leaving. We had a one on one encounter with J-Pod, and they seemed to know it. They put on a show breaching, cartwheeling, spy hopping, tail lobbing, and pectoral slapping. Sea World showcases these moves in their shows, but something about seeing it in the wild is so much more gratifying. There is something about dolphins, orcas being the largest members of the dolphin family, that people connect with. Dolphins have been active in human history as a figure that wants to make a bond with humans and as a creature people can count on. The dolphin was an important animal to the Greeks and Romans and they even immortalized the dolphin in the stars by naming a constellation after it. Although I love them all, it’s difficult not to have a favorite. My favorite animal is in J-Pod and her scientific designation is J-28, however her name is also immortalized in the stars: Polaris. She was born in late 1993 and I saw her as a calf with my dad in the summer of 1994 with her mother. She was a small calf and was her mother’s first, which lessened her chances of survival. However, Polaris beat the odds and she’s still swimming around with her mother and little sister, Tallequah, today. I only had one brief look at Polaris… until yesterday. J-Pod was swimming near False Bay on the west side of the island and we took our guests to see them as they swam up the coast. We make it a point to slow down far away so people can observe from a distance and then once we get to the 100 yard limit, people think we’re really close. We were about 250 yards off from a group of males when a whale came up right next to the boat. Her loud exhale shocked me and I turned to see the trailing edge of a female dorsal with a nick exactly in the middle of it. There is only one whale in J-Pod with that feature: J-28! I prayed that she’d come up close again as we instantly shut down the engine. My prayers were answered as she stayed with us for about 15 minutes. She was by herself and just investigating the boat. She spy hopped near us and I could see her eye looking right at our boat. Then she decided to play for us, wrapping herself in kelp fronds and rolling around. This behavior is called kelping and it’s very cute. Haha. I was so excited to see her and she definitely made my day. To top it all off, we had a man who was retired from NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) on our boat. He didn’t tell me until after our encounter when he shared that he represented the United States in the meetings of the International Whaling Commission. In other words, he was a big wig. I was a little nervous about having such a high profile person on board, but I still worked the boat as usual. When he got off the boat, he shook my hand and said, “You are a fabulous naturalist. You have NOAA’s stamp of approval.” I don’t like to brag, but that was probably one of the best compliments I’ve ever received.

I hope everyone is doing well. It won’t be long until we’re all together and can share stories in person. Take care!

New Paintings:

Dirty Dancing ~ inverted tail slap painting that I gave to Jean, Adam, and Cindy
I'll Fly Away ~ a nightly breach painting that I gave to Captains Pete and Nancy
Point Break ~ transient orcas breach at sunset... currently in my bedroom Sunset Somersaults ~ multiple resident orca breaches... also hanging above my bed

Surfin' USA ~ a travelling pod of orcas that I gave to Pat, our office manager

T Time ~ transient orca, T-14, swimming at sunset. I'm going to give this one to Hobbes, the first captain I worked with alone and T-14 was the whale we frequently saw. He's British, so the title, while refering to transient time, also works perfectly for him! haha.