Connections |
Electronic gadgets have become so pervasive that, whenever I see young people just passing the time away, I expect to see them fiddling with a hand-held video game or adjusting the volume on their iPod or text-messaging some other young person on their cell phone.
So it was especially heartening when, a few days ago, I noticed some children aboard a boat I was riding on doing nothing but staring at the water.
We were returning to the coast of Maine from Monhegan Island aboard a boat that ventures back and forth between the two a few times a day. It was an especially calm day on the water, so as many people as could fit were sitting above deck and, like the children, staring at the water.
We'd been told by the boat's captain that we might see anything from the occasional seal or porpoise to, if we were really lucky, whales -- albeit small ones. But when you live in upstate New York, even a small whale is a very big deal.
Back to those children.
They represented a range of ages, but most of them appeared to be of middle-school age. Some of them dozed in the midday sun. But some were genuinely engaged in a search for whatever marvel from the deep might suddenly appear before them. A few peered through binoculars. Others scanned the water and waited.
They were not disappointed. About halfway back to the mainland, a crew member spotted a whale off the boat's starboard side. The children were quickly at attention, pressing against the rails and staring out to sea in hopes of another sighting. A minute or two passed, then there it was again -- the dark back of a small whale, breaking above the surface for a precious few seconds and becoming for, many of us, the first whale we had ever seen.
I tend to think of young adolescents as a bit jaded -- a little too exposed to all that life has to offer, so much so that they bore easily and expect to be entertained. Thus the popularity of gadgets, especially whatever new bit of plastic and wire has just hit the market.
But in one moment on a gloriously clear day off the coast of Maine, no gadget could match the thrill and the simple beauty of one undersea creature bursting through the water and disappearing again in a heartbeat.
I hope those children will never forget what they saw that day -- and never forget that the natural world still has the power to amaze us if we're just willing to pay attention. Like the parents and grandparents who took those children aboard that boat, we adults can provide the opportunities.
Nature will take it from there.
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