Elephant Seal
Saturday morning’s sun turned to clouds by the time I arrived at Anna’s house. She’d wanted to walk down to the beach, but a stroll no longer seemed as appealing in the chilly wind. “Let’s drive to a café in Oak Bay,” I said. As we drove past McNeill Bay, we spotted a little crowd peering over the concrete storm barrier down to the beach. Anna said, “Do you think that’s—”
“—Emerson?” I said. “It could be! I heard he was down here.”
Emerson is quite the Victorian celebrity. Crowds gather wherever he goes, even if it’s just to watch him sleep. Oh, did you think I meant the poet? Silly me. I meant the elephant seal.
Emerson the seal can’t stay away from Victoria. He was born two years ago near Deception Pass, the narrows between Whidbey Island and Fidalgo Island, American islands just south of here. But he prefers Canadian waters. Not just any Canadian waters; he keeps coming back to Victoria when it’s time for his yearly moult. Nowhere else will do.
Anna and I bought chocolate caramel tarts and hot drinks and strolled down to the beach to join the little cluster of folks. Wind whipped our hair as we peer down at the logs and sand. Sure enough, there he was, right below us. No lean, starved poet, he—a fat, elongated blob the same bleached colour as the logs. He put his head up for a moment and stared at us with his black eyes, then flopped back down beside the wall, snorting and shuffling like an old guy trying to get comfy in his bed.
His spring moult will take him about a month; he’ll lose his top layer of skin and hair in a painful process. Anna and I speculated about whether this happens in one go, like a snake sliding out of its skin, or in patches. “Imagine if that’s what happened to us as teenagers,” Anna said.
Adolescence can certainly feel that way inside: like your skin just don’t fit right.
Emerson is about 500 pounds now but has yet to develop the trademark schnoz of a full-grown male elephant seal. His current nose is so cute it’s a bit sad to think he’ll replace it with a drooping flesh-sack someday. Apparently it helps the males make obnoxiously loud noises during mating season (no accounting for taste) and conserve moisture while they hang out and flirt on the beach. (The proboscis recycles moisture as they breathe.) We’re all used to the curious harbour seals; their glossy heads poke up almost any time you’re down by the beach for a while. But elephant seals—I’d never seen one.
I’d been wanting to see Emerson for a while. I went down to the Gorge, the inlet that curves up from Victoria’s harbour, to see him a few weeks ago; he’d been there for a week or so. But just the day before, they’d coaxed Emerson into a van and dropped him off way up north in Barkley Sound, near Uclulet, 150 km away from Victoria. They hoped he’d finish his moult in peace on the solitary beach, away from people and aggressive dogs. But Emerson came back last week. Poor guy—he swam so hard to get here in six days. What a sense of direction, and through the choppy west coast waves.
Why shouldn’t Emerson like Victoria? He chose Oak Bay, rated second-best place to live in all of Canada. Granted, mostly rich folk live behind the “Tweed Curtain”. But Emerson’s got enough fat keeping him toasty. He doesn’t need exorbitant beachfront housing.
I find the purest enjoyment in sharing a moment of wonder in nature with strangers. A little girl kept grinning at me as we both stared at Emerson, so amused by him doing nothing more that spoon a log or shuffle forward a few feet. We didn’t say anything to each other; we just understood.
There’s a lot of in-your-face natural wonder on the west coast: mountains and ocean and all manner of big and potentially dangerous creatures. We expect each other to be impressed. Everyone considers it their duty to inform others of a whale sighting. Only those dead inside would refuse to look when directed, “Whale!”
But such nature moments can happen in the ordinary too. Years ago, I was waiting downtown to cross the street. A huge flock of pigeons lifted from the roof of the tall building across the street and began flying around and around the flagpole on the top. They must have flown around about a hundred times. I couldn’t look away, and neither could a couple strangers stopped at the crosswalk with me. We stood there together as the crossing signal came and went, watching the birds, laughing and in awe.
In these moments, we’re confronted with mystery, with something unlike us and inexplicable. Sure, Emerson looks like he’s smiling the way we do when we’re on a beach vacation. But we all know most of his life is spent in depths we’ll never see. We’re fascinated by what’s unlike us. There’s something transcendent, something that lifts us out of our navel-gazing or to-do lists.
I wish we understood a little more what mystery we encounter in our own species, too. The other is always a chance to be curious about the unknown. Sometimes when harbour seals bob up and stare, I imagine they dive down to tell their friends, “I saw a human up close today!”
As Marilynne Robinson says, “This is an interesting planet. It deserves all the attention you can give it.” We can pay attention wherever we are. Yet I remain grateful to live somewhere nature smacks us in the face with 500-pound reminders that “there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy”. Long live Emerson, and may he moult in peace.