Secret Memory I

It is September 2015 and I am standing on an island volcano looking east. The vastness of the Pacific Ocean sprints away, tapering to a dissolved line where it engulfs the shining sky.

It is my lunch break and I am hungry. Swiftly down the lush tracks to where the water meets black basalt. I take out my lunchbox, cast my pack down, sit on it. Two oranges peeled carefully then devoured, next a sandwich wrapped in tinfoil. Polarized blue lenses cut through the pristine water to an untouched world.

I finish my sandwich and fold the foil, returning it to my bag with the orange skins, except for one brightly-shining corner that I tear off. I find a loose thread from my high-vis and gently draw it out so as not to snap. I twist the foil into a silver bow, tie the thread, and begin flicking it in and out where the rocks dropoff into deep crystal.

Within a few casts the first curious eyes can be seen. Wrasse and young Kahawai swim to the surface to confidently investigate this shining mystery in their home. I flick my wrist and the ‘fly’ dances across the surface, plip-plip-plip, staying just out of reach of everyone’s jaws. A few moments later and the first shark arrives: a Kermadec Dogfish about the size of my arm. In the bright daylight it gropes sluggishly for the lure and is beaten at every turn by the nimbly swarming Kahawai.

Then suddenly royalty shows up. Man-long and bull-headed, drawn in from their coast-cruising by the commotion, they muscle silently into the swirl. Their first edict is to bully poor-old Dogfish, head-butting and nibbling its sensitive fins until it sullenly turns and vanishes into depth. Scarred and sacred, these Kingies are ancient giants and the  smaller fish (of which there are now hundreds from a dozen species) part and flow around them like sparkling satellites. Fierce old eyes regard the flickering foil with some interest.

The day is glittering and a green turtle pops it’s head up to throw me a vanishing glance. White Terns ride the basaltic thermals back to their chicks in the clifftop Pohuts’, with rows of gleaming silver daggers in their beaks. Far above us a Frigate watches ominously, waiting for a wealthier target to waylay.

Outside the mouth of Boat Cove I can hear dozens of Paikea, Humpback Whales, making their way south-searching towards Antarctica. The explosive rapport of their breathing skates over the water, accompanied by mighty geysers of mist.

In this protected wilderness I am one of only ten humans allowed to be here, and we are the only ten within a million square miles. How bursting with life was the wild-world of not-so-long-ago! So bright with curiosity that a thread, foil scrap, and five minutes was enough to summon up an entire marine community like wild magic.

…

When my year was up, and I finally returned to the real world, I struggled to reintegrate. Everywhere felt profoundly empty, lacking in life and curiosity. If you could imagine returning from an overseas trip to find most of the people living in your hood had vanished… but you were the only person who could see that they were gone, that’s what it felt like to me. The fact that it was normal made civilisation feel insane.

I think the world presents us with evidence about what is vital and true all the time. Sometimes it is a moment of clarity, an epiphany where all the dots connect. Or it might present as a vision, visitation, or trip that feels impossibly profound. Sometimes just a deep and wordless knowing in the heart. Or even just a repeatable line on a chart.

Every big truth comes with the same challenge: how deeply do you carve it into your bones?

…

Yesterday morning I couldn’t sleep, so I went to the coast before dawn to watch the fishermen pulling in their nets. Next to them were rows of cliché brides and grooms getting their wedding-shots at dawn, like plastic figurines on a conveyor belt. It took seven men an hour to pull in their net and there was barely a bucket of small fish to show for it. I could see their worry and frustration, the shadows of apathy.

Last night we went back to the beach to pick up trash, filling bag after bag with littered food wrappers and water bottles. We hauled the bags up to the road and filled the empty rubbish bins lining the sidewalks. People watched us with eyes that were anything but curious, fierce, or interested.

Good thing we weren’t seeking their praise or validation.