One Day at Sea
So, the penguins went down the frozen water in single file. Then they swam past the seals as they swam frivolously shaking their fins. They swam and returned to land and made jump back into the open waves.
At a distance, the whales were swimming showing off their gray and white backs. Then in a wondrous parade they shot off their water fountains from their snouts. Then as one whale dived it came across a strange species, the one it was used to seeing on land more than open sea. It had one head with two small and two small legs like the ones it sees so many times on boats. It looked at its small body and it seemed that it did not move. The whale realized that it had seen this before. A lot of fish all of a sudden stop moving and are just left to fall to the bottom to the sea. But it had never seen a species like this and it seemed to be floating before it would fall. The whale wondered what it could do to help it. But, it realized that it was beyond help. It wondered what brought that small body that far into the ocean. So, it decided to swim a bit and find out.
As it swam further, it floated over this old boat that was at the bottom of the sea for such a long time, and saw a tiny non-fish body hovering around it. What a strange time, thought the whale, a big as I am I do not like to dive down that deep. It stayed on top of the strange non-fish body then it felt the sea shudder as that disappeared from where it was. The whale got scared as it thought that the small body it saw a few minutes earlier might have come from the tiny non-fish body that just vanished. It continued to swim as many other sea creatures escaped the ripples in the sea.
The whale went on hoping that it would not find any more of the small body’s species lying around, as this used to happen sometimes. As it swam further, it came across a boat. It was not the kind of boat it is used to seeing. The kind of boat it was used to seeing was the boat where people stood and waved. Some of them put something in front of their faces, either really close with two hands on it, or, lately, far away from their face. Then when its water fountain came out, they jumped up and down and some sounds came from them.
This boat was different. It was full of people, more than the usual number it was used to seeing on boats. The boat, unlike other boats it had seen before, seemed to be unbalanced from the number of people on top of it. It seemed to struggle as it moved through the waves, and unlike the open space in the sea that the whale enjoys so much, this species could not have any breathing room as they stood next to each other, with little to no space between them. It did not seem that they were enjoying their time like the people of the other boats do.
The whale thought that they were in trouble as it seemed that this boat’s back was about to be pushed under the weight of the people on it. The whale saw many small bodies like the one it had seen earlier. But, unlike that small body that did not move, these bodies, were making voices that were not pleasant. Then other bigger bodies followed them. The ones with the big bodies put their arms around the small bodies, and then swam. They swam in more than one direction. The whale knew that they had no direction to go, and it could do nothing to help them.
The whale wondered why people would do what they do. It understands that when it has young, not only it, but all the whales in the sea protect them and do not let come into danger. Why is two armed, two legged species letting their young get into danger? Why is it that they are not everything they could to protect them? Why do they leave them in a place like the sea, where only the inhabitants understand how to deal with it? Why are other, older, wiser whales not trying to stop this from happening?
It wanted to find a way to protect them but still could not understand protect them from what? To protect them from each other. All it took was an act of kindness, an act of understanding, and act of recognition that as a species they are the same: one head; one nose; two eyes; two arms; two legs and one heart.