I was trying to find an old license from decades ago that I might need for a job application. I looked all through my files and then had to look through storage containers. In doing so, I found a journal from my time photographing and swimming with spotted dolphins and humpback whales. I started reading and found a meditation written from my experience with whales.
The license wasn’t what I needed to find. It was the journal. Isn’t it wonderful how life works!?! The same messages I was receiving and recording 11 years ago, are coming strong now. Not only was it a validation for me, but a wonderful remembering of feeling dolphins push against my body as we swam in perfect harmony. And of humpback whales connecting with their calves. I still get goosebumps!
I hope you enjoy this meditation gifted from the whales to me…and now to you.
Imagine our Sun, in about 5 billion years, expanding into a red giant star. After it uses the hydrogen at its core, it will swell dramatically and engulf Mercury, Venus, and most likely Earth. Before then, the Sun will brighten gradually at about 1% every 100 million years. This will make Earth’s surface too hot for liquid water within 1 to 1.5 billion years. Imagine this, if only for a moment. The unimageable beauty here….lost.
That’s what I think of, what my heart aches about. It’s long after everyone I know dies and most likely long after humans exterminate ourselves from our toxic ways…emotional, physical, mental, and spiritual toxicity. But the mountains, oceans, wildlife, plant life…unimaginable loss of beauty.
With this ending of life as we know it a billion years or 365,242,500,000 days away, it makes everything here so much more precious, so sacred. And yet, since 1760, when the Industrial Revolution began, 266 years ago, we have systematically destroyed entire ecosystems. Between 1500 and 2004, 784 species have been listed as extinct. Over 160 species were declared extinct between 2010 and 2019. 2024-Slender-billed Curlew; 2023 eight different species of honeycreeper birds and eight different species of freshwater mussels. In 2020 31 species were declared extinct in a single update including several freshwater fish species and the Splendid Poison Frog. 2011…the Western Black Rhinoceros. The list goes on….
So, in other words, humans are doing quite a fine job of destroying life on Earth long before the Sun vaporizes all water on the planet. In fact, we have been speeding up the process by shifting from traditional energy to burning fossil fuels and creating massive deforestation, both of which release enormous amounts of greenhouse gases. Since 1850, this has increased atmospheric CO2 from 280 to 419 ppm, causing a rise in temperature. This creates climate instability which intensifies weather events such as droughts, wildfires, and floods. It’s estimated that switching from human and animal power to fossil-fueled machines established a 50 times faster rate of warming compared to previous natural variations.
Since I documented the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Disaster from April 2010 to April 2011, I have been keenly aware of the damage humans do to our planet. I felt shame at being part of a species that in its greed for more, more, more is destroying such a precious jewel of a planet—a rare place that we take for granted every single day.
Sunset Gulf Shores, Alabama 2014 with iPhone
It’s beyond my capacity to understand how humans, as a collective, can create so much destruction and not understand the consequences of our actions. Many of us are awake to the reality of how every action we takes has an effect, for good or bad. But the rape and pillage of Earth continues. More! More! More! is our chant and as more species are lost, more catastrophic weather events occur, more deforestation occurs, we are truly creating what we focus on. Though perhaps not the ‘more’ we wish for.
I didn’t intend to write a depressing essay on the death of Earth. My intention was to write something that somehow illustrates the depth of love I have for this planet and all life here. And yet, to do that, I must share what is at stake: beauty so profound, life so sacred, that even with astronomical observations over the past 100 years, we have found nothing like it within or outside of our solar system. That’s not to say it’s not out there somewhere. But so far, life as we know it exists here. Now. The depth of grief I have over our collective destruction of it is immeasurable.
But when I journey into the grief, I find a depth of love and appreciation so profound, it lifts me into ecstasy. I remember looking a baby humpback whale in its massive eye as it swam past with its mother. I remember a sea turtle and I diving together, sharing a morning swim in Bonaire…a sea lion and I exchanging acrobatic play in the Sea of Cortez…a deer emerging from the forest, walking up to me, and licking my hand while gazing into my eyes…a juvenile manatee chewing my hair while its mother took my hand with her flippers and placed it on her heart…a baby manatee resting its head in my hand as tears of love filled my mask (and roll down my face as I remember now)…a spotted dolphin pushing against my body to help me keep up with the pod…fog hovering over the creek as sunlight created a golden color that transformed the world….a double rainbow filled with golden light that caused me to stop my car and dance along the side of the road with joy….the aurora as it illuminated the sky in Great Smoky Mountains National Park and caused me to laugh hysterically at midnight as the wind carried my voice up the mountain at Kuwohi…the bear emerging from the steep bank with his 350+ pounds and allowing me the grace to back up and allow him to cross my pass as my knees knocked…the snowfall in Canyon de Chelly that transformed a hike down the trail into a magic so powerful it forever changed me…the birth of my daughter that showed me what love truly is…all of these moments of beauty and countless more, come from an appreciation of beauty, a realization of how rare and unique life is and a willingness to feel the grief and choose love. Choose life. And do whatever I can to raise awareness of beauty and how freaking lucky we are to live on a planet that is a precious, rare jewel in the Cosmos.
A few weeks ago, in my muggle world job, someone mentioned seeing my book, Cosmic Whales: Mystical Stories from the Sea, in a local bookstore. She said she had no idea I was a writer and photographer. Sometimes I forget, too.
When I got home I picked up a copy of the book and began to read it. I remember being in Mexico cave diving when I was doing the final edits to it. I would return from being in the magical realm of the highly decorated underwater caves and would start work on reading the copy again. I read it outside, on the beach, where hundreds of tiny sea turtle tracks criss-crossed the beach from their hatch the night before. It was the perfect place to put the finishing touches on this book….one of my favorite creative journeys.
As I read through the book, I could scarcely believe I wrote the poetic prose that goes so deep into the beauty of the sea and whales, dolphins, manatee, sea lions, sea turtles…all birthed from personal experience with these amazing creatures. This book is a glimpse into the heart of the sea, into my heart.
I’m reminded of the creative mystic that resides within my soul that needs to stir the cauldron and pull out inspiration. My task then is to create space for her to dance words and sentences into being, to journey with her into the forests of these ancient mountains with my photography gear and let images come to life.
It took a while, but gradually it began to sink in and memories began to flash and emotions arose. Friends…Hans and Renee at Lulu’s with the surprise Freddy and the Fishsticks free show during the oil spill….Greensboro and the dive club—building and setting up a tiki bar, offering refreshments to strangers passing by…the concert at Auburn when I was attending college there…Raleigh and lightning so bad I thought we’d all die on the aluminum bleachers…Pensacola and my pal Milton…Jazz Fest in New Orleans…so many amazing memories of concerts, but that’s just a small part of the sweetness.
Jimmy Buffett was basically a home-town boy, from where I grew up, that used his smarts and talent to soar to the stars with ideas and creativity. He built a freaking empire of Parrot Heads and was able to capitalize on fun and sun and letting go of worries. He did something incredible with the life he was given. That’s impressive…and inspiring.
As I reflected on JB today, I saw how his music is interwoven into the story of my life. And so many other lives. What a legacy to leave behind.
He brought an intense focus on loving the Ocean, one of my passions. He championed manatees, as he supported Save the Manatee Club. He connected us to our Mother Ocean.
(When I was documenting the oil spill along the Gulf Coast in 2010)
When I asked Siri to play Jimmy Buffett this morning this is what I heard, “Mother Mother Ocean, I have heard your call. Wanted to sail upon your waters since I was three feet tall, You’ve seen it all, you’ve seen it all.” That song was a reminder of my call to dive under the surface and experience the underwater world of coral reefs, humpback whales, dolphins…the salt has always been in my blood. It’s my favorite song written by Jimmy. (A Pirate Looks at Forty).
Growing up on the Alabama coast, so much of the soundtrack of my life was JB’s music because I could relate to what he was singing about…the salt air, open water. His poet’s soul called to mine, and helped me walk the path of my heart.
I’m not saying I continued to listen to his music so much after I rounded 50. I didn’t attend concerts since the last one in Pensacola with my buddy, Milton. It became too much, too many people, too much chaos. The thing I love about his music wasn’t in the mass of drunken people. As I grew into middle age, I found his music became more of a foundation that led me to songwriters he worked with, so my musical horizons expanded and I met people like Will Kimbrough, who wrote with Jimmy, and creates amazing songs, and Mary Gauthier, who wrote Wheel Inside the Wheel, one of my favorite ‘JB’ songs.
It seems a lot of musicians are leaving us these days, yet they leave behind a legacy of music that continues to feed our souls and help us reflect on our lives. The reflection on my younger years seems to happen on a deeper level every time one of our legends crosses over into that endless place of dreams. Unwinding from where I am now, I journey back to growing up on the Gulf Coast, relationships, friendships…life choices that completely changed my life’s trajectory because I chose to live fully, jumping in with wild abandon.
Congratulations JB on a life well-lived. And thank you.
All photographs by Simone Lipscomb, except the one of me and that was taken by my brother, Lance Lipscomb.
