I just rented the movie “March of the Penguins,” or “Eight Different Ways Penguin Eggs and Hatchlings Bite the Dust,” according to my daughter.
I can see her point. Emperor penguins endure a Sisyphean struggle against the elements while tending their eggs in Antarctica. The fathers literally stand for two straight months, huddled en masse to keep warm, backs braced against the sub-zero winds, each protecting a single egg that teeters precariously atop their feet. They enfold the egg in a layer of fur and fat, and waddle even more awkwardly than normal because if they lose hold of the egg, or expose it to the atmosphere, it will immediately freeze and die.
An egg also expires if either parent succumbs to starvation, exposure or predators – common occurrences all. The breeding ground for these birds is heartless, and yet the penguins march back, year after year, to endure more of the same.
Maybe they don’t have a choice, or maybe they can’t resist their own instincts, but the way I see it, to undergo this ultimate test of dedication, emperor penguins need more than a fair amount of will-power and emotional commitment to see their task to its completion.
I love how animals do that. They can brave the extremes, edging along the borders of death, and register not a single complaint. To the contrary, when my Starbucks hot chocolate is served lukewarm, I’m howling at the moon. And don’t get me started on the subject of cold weather. Once the temperature dips below 65, I start thinking about migrating to Arizona.
I was never a nature lover. As a city child, I played on lots of asphalt and concrete. I was also somewhat afraid of grass, and I didn’t know the names of many plants or flowers. I explored the world through books, which meant that I experienced life mentally, in the abstract, and nothing was further-removed from my personal biosphere than Mother Earth and all her creatures great and small.
Though I am no longer indifferent to nature’s diversity and beauty, I came to appreciate it fairly late, and now I find myself continually amazed by how astonishing our world is. Everything – animal life, plant life, mineral life – offers a different twist on the tale; everything has a story to share. I almost hate to go near the phrase “intelligent design,” but in a descriptive sense, it works for me – “intelligent” because the natural world is knowledgeable, “design” because nothing is without intent or purpose. Maybe the optimum word here is “wisdom.”
Nature doesn’t experience shame; it therefore has no reason to hide itself from scrutiny. Yet, it is also deeply mysterious and its lessons are revealed, not taught.
For students like me who are in the remedial reading group of life, nature is a teacher both accessible and elusive. But it is also unfathomably patient, like a dog letting little kids dress him up in sunglasses and a hat, like a tulip bulb buried in the dirt, awaiting spring’s arrival, like an emperor penguin hatching his chick in the snow.
Acosta is a Los Altos resident. You can contact her at [email protected].
