moko's deep blue give

When I was a child, I lived for those Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom specials. My little girl self was immersed in bliss and wonder as I traveled the far corners of the world, sneaking a peek at our world’s magnificent creatures without ever leaving my green shagged, lava-lamped room. I felt humbled at the opportunity to see such exotic beauty when all I had was a cow and a couple of chickens. For awhile, it was my greatest dream to hang from the trees, roam the Serengeti and swim the seas with Cousteau.

Last spring, I remember reading an amazing story that surfaced by way of New Zealand. It seems that for a few years now, Mahia Beach has had a bottle nosed citizen named Moko, who likes to buddy up and play in the surf with all the locals from time to time. Her antics and sense of fun have been a delight to the community and it was on a particular day last March when she showed her more serious side. A mother Pygmy and her calf, had become disoriented and beached themselves on a sandbar (hear that US Navy?) The rescue team had worked more than an hour trying to get them back on track but to no avail. Suddenly, Mahia’s gray torpedo got down to business, pushing herself past the workers and with porpoiseful meaning led mama and baby to the channel that took them safely back out to sea.


So this Maori beauty is my blog inspiration for the week. We humanoids can't take all the glory, can we? This altruistic move from one of our fellow mammal types was really something. Not surprising, but really something. Nature and its majesty, its innate goodness, continue to astound me and serve as a sort of natural anti-depressant just when I need it most. Down deep, beyond the blue, Moko and all her homies are a reflection of who we really are, life at its truest, fairest and most profound....not a lot of that gray matter interfering with things. Taking only what is needed and nothing more..the dynamics of brute strength and laser precision exceeded only by its quiet, unfathomable beauty and adaptable perfection (whether ya believe that last part or not)! Until every inhabitant on this amazing orb can understand that we are one and the same and that are very lives depend on this incredibly woven, rhythmic, mystical current, we are going to continue to say goodbye to these amazing creatures, one by one. And someday to ourselves if we're not careful. We got our condor back but we're starting to lose our polar bears. I love dogs and cats like everybody else but I wish people would look a little deeper into the chain and see that all the wild life that peppers our planet is indeed an integral, vital, necessary part of our life force, whether it comes when we call, or sleeps at the foot of our bed and we gotta protect her. I can't help but imagine what some of the 41 billion dollars a year (in this country alone) that is spent of on our pets could do to help the situation of some of our planet's species. It is these majestic, colorful, faraway lives that are the spokes in the wheel of our existence...the rain forest, our very breath.

Yep, we’re a team alright, no matter what covers our epidermis or hangs from our bark. And now the lunkheads wanna dig in the Arctic’s "vast nothingness". Last time I checked, caribou and foxes were something. All so we can drive an Escalade. Ugh. Sometimes I think we should all go Amish. It would simplify things for sure. Something about Geez with a long beard though, it just doesn't work for me. You know, each to his own, but this Mama has chosen to avoid zoos and anything barricaded when it comes to that magical introduction between children and their slippery, hairy, spiny counterparts. My dough’s gonna be spent on the boxed DVD set of Planet Earth or my Jane Goodall Animal Series books (thanks, Aunty T.)..& if I'm really fortunate, on a couple of good snorkels to strap across my munchkin's mugs while we soak it all up one day in my beloved Cook's Bay. I don’t mean to be a Debbie Downer but it is just so profoundly sad to me that any creature spends its life behind bars...left to circle in a shallow pool. wasting its aerial majesty on some dude eating funnel cake who just spent 59 bucks on Jr. so he could get splashed, or is whipped to run a track so fast that their ankles break. I think we can do better than that. We owe Moko, ourselves, that much.

Click here for a moment of bliss!
...and here if you wanna bone up on the Arctic!