A Whale of a Tale of a Whale's Tail

     "It's Hook!" the men around the boat began to shout.
     Your mother and I were standing at the front of the boat watching the blue whale rise, exhale a plume of mist into the air and then dive for deeper water. (Whales do this, ride along the surface of the water so you can see their backs rise and fall three or four times and then you will see their back slides along the surface of the water -- the blue whale is the largest animal on the planet so the back can seem to go on FOREVER -- and then at the end as the dive deep, their tale will flick up.
     In this case, that curve was how they recognize the whale they called "Hook".
     The men were giddy to recognize the telltale curve (on the left in the photo) of one side of the whale's tale. They were unsure if the fluke had been bitten when the whale was young or had just grown misshapen, but they recognized the whale by his tail. (In either event, they said, the whale had learned how to swim a little different from other whales since the fluke helps propel the whale forward.)
     Because whales live under the surface of the ocean this is one of the only ways to get to recognize them. (Unless you spent time swimming under water with them, because they aren't likely to come out to go for a walk with you on land. (And I'm sure they mean no offense by this.))
     And I was thinking about the ways we get to know each other, we humans, that is. We can go for days and days without seeing relatives we love. Or friends. We don't always know when they'll pop to the surface and sometimes when we call to them, it may take a while to hear any call back.
     How much do we know of each other then? How much of us will remain out of sight to our parents, to friends, to coworkers?
    Perhaps the best thing we can do -- and this is an awfully difficult thing to do for blue whales because they are so big and it takes so much energy for them to get ABOVE water -- perhaps the best thing we can do is do our best to leap out of the water sometimes, show ourselves, no matter how shy or afraid of ridicule we might feel.
     While I think we often spend our lives living just below the surface the way these blue whales your mother and I saw, I think there is something fantastic and beautiful if we can do our best to swim deep and get a great running start and show the world who we really are.