What if?

Over the past year and a half, I have had several things happen that made me wonder, 'what if?' What if I had followed my childhood dream and become a marine biologist? In July of 2013 I took my first whale watching tour and saw something I never thought I would ever see in my entire life. When I was a child,  I always had a love for larger animals. Both elephants and whales fascinated me and at some point I decided that I wanted to be a marine biologist. I learned everything I could about whales and was disheartened to hear that there were many that were soon to become extinct if nations continued to hunt them in the numbers that they did. One of the species most at risk was the largest animal to ever live on the planet, the blue whale. The numbers had become so low, it was impossible even to count how many were left and I was worried that I would never get to see one. Not only did we see whales on that fateful day in July. The blue whale was the first whale I ever saw. 

Unfortunately, none of my pictures were very good. A blue whale blends well with it's environment and though their blows can be as tall as 40 feet, we never knew where they would surface. Often we heard the huge exhale before we saw where they were. Luckily, there were also humpbacks. One decided to show off and do some fin and tail slapping. No breaches, but that was okay. He still looked like he was having lots of fun.
I have to take a moment to recommend very highly the whale tour that we went on. Monterey Bay Whale Watch is owned and operated by a marine biologist and every tour is led by marine biologists. What makes that so special is the knowledge that they carry, not just about the whales, dolphins, and other mammals in the water, but about the birds as well. Many of them you'll never see unless you're out in the open ocean.

Last year, I saw one movie and read one book that both resonated strongly with me. Blackfish is a documentary that shows the darker side of SeaWorld. I want to discuss this topic in more depth in another blog, but it did remind me that I often wondered what it would be like to work as a trainer with dolphins and whales. In Listening to Whales, I had a glimpse of what my life could have been like, had I pursued my dream. In this memoir, Alexandra Morton tells of her life recording and learning the language of killer whales. I will talk in more detail about this in the same blog; however, it made me yearn for her life terribly.

So do I regret not continuing that path toward the sea? Not for a minute. If I hadn't followed the path I chose, I may have never moved to Northern California. Then I wouldn't have met Kevin and we wouldn't have known Albie. And we would never be able to take all our wonderful trips. Life is a journey, not a destination. Years ago, my mother gave me a shirt with a wonderful quote by E. M. Forster, "We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us."