Whales!

Back in December I made a New Years resolution to see a whale. Despite living on some Pacific coast for my whole life I had never seen one. As good timing finds those with an intention, I saw one within a few days off the coast of Hilo when we were showing my Australian girlfriends around on their first day there. My brother pointed out a humpback waving it's big fin at us, and I waved back.

This past Monday I was taking an afternoon walk around Redondo and as I was walking up the ramp to go back home I noticed a strange mist out in the ocean, and then what looked like a fountain coming up out of the water, then another one, and another one. There was a father and daughter with binoculars looking out and the dad told me there was a group of about five blue whales out there. I stood there and watched for a while, just amazed that the biggest living mammal was out there.

I was so excited about this I ran home and called by brother and dad (the two best ocean men I know) and then sent out a group text message to about ten people in the area with the hope that someone else would be just as excited as I was and make an effort to go see these whales. There was one person who I almost didn't bother texting because for some reason assumed he wouldn't care. But surprise surprise the young Josh/Ethan was the one person who called me from the beach saying "where are they????" No sense in assuming. You just never know. Kudos to you my huckleberry friend.

And more assumptions challenged. I was so amazed by these whales I built it up in my head that this was some kind of once in a lifetime event and I was so lucky to have such good timing and what a good sign this is and so on and so on. A couple of days later I saw the same thing, and again I thought holy shit this is amazing I'm seeing them AGAIN do these whales know that I'm here watching them and really what are the chances of this, I'm the luckiest person alive! A nice lady with a nose ring smoking a cigarette let me use her binoculars and I was gawking at the whales she said, "yeah they've been out here everyday feeding on the krill out there." Grounded. A little voice in my head laughed and said this has nothing to do with you, the whales are here to eat!

So letting go of reason, I have had an enjoyable week observing the marine wildlife. Everyday this week I've watched either whales or dolphins. There is something so beautiful about that.

I have two other new years resolutions. Both come with some degree of chance, or I should say the outcome is not one of those things I can really work towards. If I could, I would go full on into it. I am absolutely willing to work hard for this things I want, so instead this year I challenged myself to choose things that require a little letting go of control. We'll shall see.

I bet people who design book covers for a living hate the expression "never judge a book by its cover." - Mark Hoppus