Dolphin Address 24
November 10th 2006
More and more e-mails rush in these days inquiring either straightforward or in a roundabout way what it is that keeps the Dolphin from her Address. And it is true, after my moving invitation to send me your support things have gone very quiet.
The most decisive cause for this is gravity. On the rocks I have to be infallible and I am. Not one serious misstep in 8 months.
As mentioned before I am looking for a habitable cave and I finally thought I found one. The only problem, however, was its entrance to be about 4 metres above ground level. I climbed a nook and cranny access with my eyes and thought it could be done.
My rockrunning had caused me not only to lose 20 kg of obviously superfluous bodyweight but also multi-cepted my leg muscles. Like a fly I sucked my pectoral cavity up the face of the rock. My fingertips ran along ridges, clawing into every crevice. Toes tentatively touching, leg stretch- and arm reaching.
When you look up, it’s just a bit higher than 2 metres, but from up there, nearly twice the length of your body is added, because you look at the ground and not at your former eye level. This enhancement of height gears you into caution.
I climbed until I needed to continue horizontally. The footholds looked as if carelessly distributed, and if they would not have been this high, I would have tried and probably succeeded in getting across. But I am a cautious man and the rocks have sharpened my judgement. I thought it better not to try. I must have relaxed on the thought, let go that tiny bit of attention, because that moment my foot slipped off the ridge. I slid off a very steep slide. There was no use balancing in slomo, all was going down, going down. I managed in spite of the friction on my left side to maintain upright position. I broke my fall on my shinbone and that hurt until it numbed. Maybe I should have gone to a doctor. I went to a dear friend who happens to have a history in falling of horses. She plastered me with Arnica, but I now know for sure: Sticks and stones can’t breaks my Burren Bones.
Some might say my fall and my hardly being able to walk for nearly a month was a blessing in disguise. I spent a lot of leg up time watching my dolphin videos, as the real thing had become too painful. I also did some telly watching since a long time. There I saw how aptly a Bonobo ape responded to the directions of her keeper. It dawned upon me that I still may have underestimated Dusty’s intelligence. That being touched emotionally by her responses distracted me from further scrutiny. I watched the videos shot earlier this year, showing Dusty and me swimming, and concentrated on those tiny events that before I had discarded as coincidental, happening for no identifiable reason. Like after a deep dive from the surface I stick out my hand and she does the buoyancy volume increase to come up to my caress, smoothly combining it with a close-up sweep along the camera.
And then there is this stone I brought up from the sea bed. I roll it a bit about in my hand while she keeps a mildly benevolent eye on it. Then I drop it, but, unlike a dog, she is not going after it. She even looks away; she knows stones do this, nothing new in that. Just when she wants to turn away from me I start to swim in the opposite direction. Then you see her lighten up: ‘Hey, you’re…, yes, oh yes let’s do that, let’s go for a swim.’ And she turns my way and hastens into speed, while glee is shining of her face and her whole body contracts into the swim.
Or the ways she keeps moving in order not to lose steerage, circling around me or taking time-outs like I jokingly referred to as ‘ powdering her nose’. I try to be aware of the conditioning effect that is ever lurking in interpreting sequences you already know the outcome of.
And sometimes I become the dolphin, feel the water flow by her body, drive and steer in ever changing balance, feel lifted into orbit mode by locomotion, correcting and timing gait, let my eyes do the work while my body glides on like forever.
Jan Ploeg, Brannockstown, November 10th 2006
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