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Great Blue
Published in Pilgrimage
Each morning in winter, we walk through the neighborhood park and out toward the pier. We play with the dog and look for birds. At 7 a.m. the sunlight angles through the trees, softening the water, which is satiny, like a baby’s skin. Thin, translucent, as if the light shines out from within. Yesterday the Gulf was robin’s egg blue. We wound our way along the path between the mangrove roots and the remaining 1950’s Florida bungalows with their human-sized porches and gabled, tin-covered roofs. We cursed the builders who cram their fancy hulks onto too small lots. At the path’s end we turned and walked back the same way we came, heading home for bran flakes and the citrus we pilfered from the neighbor’s tree.
These excursions to test the day are routine. Same time each morning, down the path and back, a regularity we’ve come to rely on as we forge through middle age. And, it never fails . . . on every one of our walks we see something exceptional tucked beneath the ordinary: a close-up of the Merganser pair down from the north, sweet low-tide smells, the water’s lap against the rough legs of the pier. And the great blue heron in the shallows – the species a U.S. wildlife biologist called “common waterfowl.” Chest-high and sporting its best breeding plumage, the bird is glamorous. Though we see a lot of them in Florida⎯one-third of North America’s 21 species lives here⎯herons were almost abolished by 19th century fashion’s lust for feathers. Great Blues made a comeback, only to be threatened again after the suburban expansion that followed World War II. Conservationists today are watching for future declines as wetland breeding sites are gobbled up by anyone with a big enough mortgage and a wish for a view of the sea.
We tiptoed toward the bird, whispering our admiration. Herons are private feeders. While it’s not uncommon to see hundreds nesting in a single bay of trees, they prefer to eat alone and practice a “stand and wait, stalk and strike” technique. So, we shuffled closer. Stopping. Stepping back…like we did as kids in church, wanting to touch the altar but stopping ourselves behind the rail, inhibited more by Sister Mary Regina’s frown than by our simultaneous fear and curiosity…to touch the hem of God.
Not wanting to disturb the heron, we headed home. But something wasn’t right. Each of us in our own way couldn’t quite continue…we were bothered, like when that “certain something” makes you stop before you lock the door, the “unattended to” insisting itself…an itch in the mind. Great Blues are skittish. It should have shown some sign of agitation when we approached. Instead, it stood anchored in the sand. Its neck, normally resting in a loose curve, was half-extended in an awkward twist, its head wrenched at a weird angle. The wings were hunched. And there was a lump. A huge lump. Something stuck in its throat. We moved closer and saw half an arm’s length of mullet dangling from its beak. And what could not be seen dangling, explained the bulge in its throat. A huge fish stuck in the great bird’s gullet. We’d seen lots of herons handle pretty big fish, but this one was choking! We were sure of it. Quick! Get the leather gloves (It’s 9” bill could skewer us). Grab the old wool blanket from the shed (We’ll need something to calm its 6’ wings). I’ll hold the bird and you yank the fish.
But, to my friend’s dismay, I was stuck. Was it right to interfere? Did she want us to perform the Heimlich on a bird? Yet, with a foot-long fish stuck in its throat, the bird must be suffering. When Avalokiteshvara, the Buddhist bodhisattva of compassion, urges us to treat all things with loving kindness, does he mean for me to rip the heron’s breakfast out backwards? Theologian, John Feinhager says God uses the whole world in the plan for redemption. So I should feel lucky, right? Was this one of those moments where ordinary life barges in and offers us an opportunity to reach out to the rest of creation? Meanwhile, my friend is running off to get the gloves.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines compassion as: “suffering together with another,” and, further, as “being moved by another’s suffering and desiring to relieve it.” But this definition has a distinctly religious feel to it. The word entered our language via the French, compass, referring to the navigation instrument. Its connection to emotional concerns comes from the compass’ circular shape: encircle, comfort, embrace. It wasn’t until the 13th century that the concept of comfort was linked to the idea of “suffering with another.” We owe this to ecclesiastical Latin (com – with and pati – to suffer) and the church’s belief that, in his crucifixion (known as “The Passion”), Christ suffered with us and for our sins.
Both the Old and New Testament refer often to compassion, from Luke’s parable of the Good Samaritan to Saul’s treasonous mercy toward Amalek and Christ’s instructions to love our neighbors as ourselves. Compassion rates 20 entries in The Bible Concordance, ranking somewhere between arrogance, with 4 references, and sin, with 107. And Jewish traditions go even deeper. In the Talmud, rahamin (compassion) is very close in meaning to rehm (womb). A Jew, in showing compassion, is believed to be a child of Abraham and closest to God’s loving embrace.
Our western tradition is not alone in elevating compassion as a fundamental virtue. And, looking deeply, the world’s religions appear to echo each other. Islam’s Qu’ran asks Muslims to soften their hearts and to practice “rahmah,” a mothering gesture. Hindu’s sacred Vedic texts (1500bc) call for restraint from harmfulness and, through a recognition of the Brahmin or universal soul, propose a mutual identity of all things, so that, echoing Christ’s teachings, love for others is inseparable from self love. For the Buddhist, true compassion is more akin to empathy, an awareness that all of us suffer together in life’s inescapable cycles. The ultimate compassionate act is not “to suffer with” (especially not from any sense of obligation or self-fulfillment) but to pray that all beings will wake to the life’s impermanence.
And, compassion isn’t solely a human affair. Dog owners swear that their pets will offer comfort whenever family members are distressed. In her book about the compassion of animals, Kristen Von Kreisler tells remarkable stories including one about a pig, with a keen sense of smell, that reportedly detected the presence of a carbon monoxide leak and raised a ruckus in order to alert a farmer’s wife that her husband had lost consciousness. These acts are not apparently limited to humans. Von Keisler tells several stories of animals who endanger their own well being by protecting or rescuing other animals.
But, while the world’s great religions ask us to be compassionate, they also charge us with knowing our limits. Islam teaches that people are bound by self-interest and that only Allah has the ability to embrace all creation. God punishes Saul for disobeying an order. The Buddhist reference to “idiot compassion” cautions us about the harm we can do if we superimpose our particular picture on others. We might be made in God’s image, but we can’t play God.
I did eventually decide to join my friend in her run for the gloves. But, before I unlocked myself, I stopped to look back at the heron. Sixty-one million years on this earth must count for something. In that split second, the bird pointed its 9” beak toward the sky, extended its neck and finished the fish in one swift gulp. Gone. Safe. Though we did not know it then, great blues, in addition to their usual diet of frogs, crabs, and small fish, can handle 11” eels, fish upwards of two pounds and, of all things, muskrats and squirrels.
Since our encounter on the beach that day, I’ve seen dozens of herons hunt for fish and I still wonder what made me want to leave the bird alone. Truth be told, I didn’t really think our rescue would upset the natural order. I was concerned that we’d get hurt, or that we’d hurt the bird. But that—also—is a sort of lie. I was hungry. I worried that the tidal muck would wreck my shoes. And (was it pride?) I probably didn’t want to give in to my friend.
I’d like to think, although I didn’t risk my own comfort for the heron’s, that I’m not the kind of person who would turn away from a choking human. But I have turned from homeless people in the park. I’ve let an unleashed dog run ownerless across the street. Compassion demands a kind of intimate contact with the world, invites the risk of exposure “with passion,” “to suffer with. So, maybe I was right, after all, to hold back from approaching the heron. And yet if, as Ghandi believed, our moral progress can be judged by the way we treat our animals, I still have a way to go.
Great Blue
Published in Pilgrimage
Each morning in winter, we walk through the neighborhood park and out toward the pier. We play with the dog and look for birds. At 7 a.m. the sunlight angles through the trees, softening the water, which is satiny, like a baby’s skin. Thin, translucent, as if the light shines out from within. Yesterday the Gulf was robin’s egg blue. We wound our way along the path between the mangrove roots and the remaining 1950’s Florida bungalows with their human-sized porches and gabled, tin-covered roofs. We cursed the builders who cram their fancy hulks onto too small lots. At the path’s end we turned and walked back the same way we came, heading home for bran flakes and the citrus we pilfered from the neighbor’s tree.
These excursions to test the day are routine. Same time each morning, down the path and back, a regularity we’ve come to rely on as we forge through middle age. And, it never fails . . . on every one of our walks we see something exceptional tucked beneath the ordinary: a close-up of the Merganser pair down from the north, sweet low-tide smells, the water’s lap against the rough legs of the pier. And the great blue heron in the shallows – the species a U.S. wildlife biologist called “common waterfowl.” Chest-high and sporting its best breeding plumage, the bird is glamorous. Though we see a lot of them in Florida⎯one-third of North America’s 21 species lives here⎯herons were almost abolished by 19th century fashion’s lust for feathers. Great Blues made a comeback, only to be threatened again after the suburban expansion that followed World War II. Conservationists today are watching for future declines as wetland breeding sites are gobbled up by anyone with a big enough mortgage and a wish for a view of the sea.
We tiptoed toward the bird, whispering our admiration. Herons are private feeders. While it’s not uncommon to see hundreds nesting in a single bay of trees, they prefer to eat alone and practice a “stand and wait, stalk and strike” technique. So, we shuffled closer. Stopping. Stepping back…like we did as kids in church, wanting to touch the altar but stopping ourselves behind the rail, inhibited more by Sister Mary Regina’s frown than by our simultaneous fear and curiosity…to touch the hem of God.
Not wanting to disturb the heron, we headed home. But something wasn’t right. Each of us in our own way couldn’t quite continue…we were bothered, like when that “certain something” makes you stop before you lock the door, the “unattended to” insisting itself…an itch in the mind. Great Blues are skittish. It should have shown some sign of agitation when we approached. Instead, it stood anchored in the sand. Its neck, normally resting in a loose curve, was half-extended in an awkward twist, its head wrenched at a weird angle. The wings were hunched. And there was a lump. A huge lump. Something stuck in its throat. We moved closer and saw half an arm’s length of mullet dangling from its beak. And what could not be seen dangling, explained the bulge in its throat. A huge fish stuck in the great bird’s gullet. We’d seen lots of herons handle pretty big fish, but this one was choking! We were sure of it. Quick! Get the leather gloves (It’s 9” bill could skewer us). Grab the old wool blanket from the shed (We’ll need something to calm its 6’ wings). I’ll hold the bird and you yank the fish.
But, to my friend’s dismay, I was stuck. Was it right to interfere? Did she want us to perform the Heimlich on a bird? Yet, with a foot-long fish stuck in its throat, the bird must be suffering. When Avalokiteshvara, the Buddhist bodhisattva of compassion, urges us to treat all things with loving kindness, does he mean for me to rip the heron’s breakfast out backwards? Theologian, John Feinhager says God uses the whole world in the plan for redemption. So I should feel lucky, right? Was this one of those moments where ordinary life barges in and offers us an opportunity to reach out to the rest of creation? Meanwhile, my friend is running off to get the gloves.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines compassion as: “suffering together with another,” and, further, as “being moved by another’s suffering and desiring to relieve it.” But this definition has a distinctly religious feel to it. The word entered our language via the French, compass, referring to the navigation instrument. Its connection to emotional concerns comes from the compass’ circular shape: encircle, comfort, embrace. It wasn’t until the 13th century that the concept of comfort was linked to the idea of “suffering with another.” We owe this to ecclesiastical Latin (com – with and pati – to suffer) and the church’s belief that, in his crucifixion (known as “The Passion”), Christ suffered with us and for our sins.
Both the Old and New Testament refer often to compassion, from Luke’s parable of the Good Samaritan to Saul’s treasonous mercy toward Amalek and Christ’s instructions to love our neighbors as ourselves. Compassion rates 20 entries in The Bible Concordance, ranking somewhere between arrogance, with 4 references, and sin, with 107. And Jewish traditions go even deeper. In the Talmud, rahamin (compassion) is very close in meaning to rehm (womb). A Jew, in showing compassion, is believed to be a child of Abraham and closest to God’s loving embrace.
Our western tradition is not alone in elevating compassion as a fundamental virtue. And, looking deeply, the world’s religions appear to echo each other. Islam’s Qu’ran asks Muslims to soften their hearts and to practice “rahmah,” a mothering gesture. Hindu’s sacred Vedic texts (1500bc) call for restraint from harmfulness and, through a recognition of the Brahmin or universal soul, propose a mutual identity of all things, so that, echoing Christ’s teachings, love for others is inseparable from self love. For the Buddhist, true compassion is more akin to empathy, an awareness that all of us suffer together in life’s inescapable cycles. The ultimate compassionate act is not “to suffer with” (especially not from any sense of obligation or self-fulfillment) but to pray that all beings will wake to the life’s impermanence.
And, compassion isn’t solely a human affair. Dog owners swear that their pets will offer comfort whenever family members are distressed. In her book about the compassion of animals, Kristen Von Kreisler tells remarkable stories including one about a pig, with a keen sense of smell, that reportedly detected the presence of a carbon monoxide leak and raised a ruckus in order to alert a farmer’s wife that her husband had lost consciousness. These acts are not apparently limited to humans. Von Keisler tells several stories of animals who endanger their own well being by protecting or rescuing other animals.
But, while the world’s great religions ask us to be compassionate, they also charge us with knowing our limits. Islam teaches that people are bound by self-interest and that only Allah has the ability to embrace all creation. God punishes Saul for disobeying an order. The Buddhist reference to “idiot compassion” cautions us about the harm we can do if we superimpose our particular picture on others. We might be made in God’s image, but we can’t play God.
I did eventually decide to join my friend in her run for the gloves. But, before I unlocked myself, I stopped to look back at the heron. Sixty-one million years on this earth must count for something. In that split second, the bird pointed its 9” beak toward the sky, extended its neck and finished the fish in one swift gulp. Gone. Safe. Though we did not know it then, great blues, in addition to their usual diet of frogs, crabs, and small fish, can handle 11” eels, fish upwards of two pounds and, of all things, muskrats and squirrels.
Since our encounter on the beach that day, I’ve seen dozens of herons hunt for fish and I still wonder what made me want to leave the bird alone. Truth be told, I didn’t really think our rescue would upset the natural order. I was concerned that we’d get hurt, or that we’d hurt the bird. But that—also—is a sort of lie. I was hungry. I worried that the tidal muck would wreck my shoes. And (was it pride?) I probably didn’t want to give in to my friend.
I’d like to think, although I didn’t risk my own comfort for the heron’s, that I’m not the kind of person who would turn away from a choking human. But I have turned from homeless people in the park. I’ve let an unleashed dog run ownerless across the street. Compassion demands a kind of intimate contact with the world, invites the risk of exposure “with passion,” “to suffer with. So, maybe I was right, after all, to hold back from approaching the heron. And yet if, as Ghandi believed, our moral progress can be judged by the way we treat our animals, I still have a way to go.
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