Dancers of the Sea on the Mystical Coast

The flow of the watery world on the Mystical Coast brought a sense of wonder to those who lived there. It was a sunny day in June of 1898 along the rainforest wilderness coast.

Near the river bar at the ocean the black and white whales leaped and splashed, joyfully singing and dancing in the waves with squeals, whistles and hums in their fun ocean playground. 

The games stopped when short, sharp, quick distress calls came from the six month old whale calf. In the dialect of whale language the calf cried for her mama.

Nuzzling the calf, the older whales saw the tangled tree vines around the calf’s flippers and the dorsal fin on it’s back.

The mama pushed her nose under the calf to lift it’s blowhole out of the water so it wouldn’t drown and began pushing forward, carrying her baby. The pod of whales swam toward a watery trail inland where the chinook salmon were swimming upstream. The whales followed the salmon to seek a delicious meal.

From the other direction miles away on the river, the sleek fishing boat known as the “Otter” moved with sails shining in the sunny day like white clouds.

Sounds of a stringed instrument floated on the salty air while the boat navigated the river at high tide. A voice rose and fell singing smoothly.

The lighthouse keeper from 8 miles away and his family rested on the deck while Tomas’ sang the stories from his lifetime on the sea. He began as a stowaway in South America, then a cabin boy, a sailor, a navigator, then became a river sage such as unheard of before. 

 When the crew and captain lost their way in foggy weather along the coast Tomas listened to the calls of the shorebirds and directed the path of the ship. His memory became evident when he repeated details of the ship, navigation, and the locations of stars and constellations after overhearing but not studying them.

He amazed everyone, but he also upset them with instances of unexplained behavior. Over time the crew and captain accepted him as eccentric and a bit odd but gifted with a mind that recorded tiniest details.

For years Tomas used his gift to help captains navigate the rivers and bays branching off the ocean on the west coasts. In the great Emerald River where massive numbers of chinook salmon swam upstream to spawn, Tomas watched the bears along the shore wading into the river and swatting the salmon, then enjoying their meals.

He also saw the black and white whales that he named his “River Whales” who also hunted the salmon as their main food. 

Tomas noted the details of each bear and whale until he began to recognize the same creatures year after year.

He saw the bigger black and white whales that feasted on larger prey such as sea lions. The smaller whales reminded him of the playful, curious dolphins who sometimes approached the ship, peering at the sailors.

Tomas saw the dorsal fin shapes on the backs of these smaller whales and over time he knew they traveled with the same pod year after year.

The friendly, social, curious smaller whales breached and flapped their tails to strike the waves, and appeared to nuzzle each other with affection. 

In the Emerald River they would approach the boat when it was anchored, floating so close Tomas and the crew reached out to rub the shiney domes of their heads and stroke their backs. When Tomas looked into the eyes of the whales he saw a friendly, calm, playful look. 

The song stories Tomas sang with his unusual, small lute became well known. When he was no longer young and spry enough to work on the big ships he built a modest cabin on the Mystical Coast near a village of 300 people on the river. 

There he served as a fishing guide and an entertainer, accepting donations in a bowl while he strummed his lute, singing and telling stories, near the docks or indoors at festive gatherings.  

Today on the deck of the “Otter” sat barrels of salmon from the morning’s fishing. The lighthouse keeper, Joseph, and his wife, Jeannie, would roast some of the fish that night and dry the rest for storage and later meals. 

Elsie, their twelve year old daughter, and their two teenage boys, Edward and Samuel, had wielded their fishing poles well and helped fill the barrels.

Out on the ocean the pod of black and white whales following the salmon swam over the bar and up the river’s path between the steep sand dunes.

Aboard the “Otter” Joseph steered the boat through an opening into a lagoon off the river to explore. The ocean was within sight. Their village and river docks at the port were several miles upstream.

The pod of black and white whales surged over the bar into the river, following the migrating salmon who instinctively swam upsteam to lay their eggs each summer.

The mama whale still carried her calf with her nose, pushing and swimming to keep up with the other family members in the pod. Bonded for life, the mothers and grandmothers were accompanied by their female and male offspring. 

Only the males left for awhile during breeding season on the southern migration to seek females from other pods who were not relatives.

Tomas saw the pod of whales from where he stood on the “Otter” and everyone watched the sleek bodies rising with rhythm out of the river and then curving back into it. They dropped anchor on the far side of the lagoon.

Now Tomas saw the pod of black and white “river whales” enter the lagoon at high tide.

“Joseph, we need to leave the lagoon before the tide goes out. At low tide the sandbar out of this lagoon will not be submerged and we’ll be trapped here,” he said.

In the wheelhouse, Joseph began making the turn toward the river. The pod of whales playfully leaped, squealed, whistled, and hummed while they socialized in their own language.

When they got closer Tomas saw the whale carrying a calf on her nose, pushing forward. She was swimming more slowly than the others, perhaps fatigued from the extra effort.

Tomas watched closely. He knew that tail fin of the mama whale. The notches had a pattern exactly where the dorsal fin bent in a curve at the top toward the whale's flukes on her tail. These smaller black and white whales all had dorsal fins that curved toward their tail flukes, different from the straighter fins of the bigger, more aggressive whales who ate larger prey farther out in the ocean. 

“Look,” he said. Joseph’s twelve-year-old daughter, Elsie was at his elbow.

“I see it,” she said. “A whale calf, tangled in something. The flippers are trapped.”

The mama whale moved slowly, resting, but keeping her baby’s blowhole out of the water.

“Such love,” said Tomas. “I’ve seen this before but not for many years.”

He whispered to himself, “Mamae’ y Babe’."

When the whales got closer Tomas began to make a plan. He looked for his sharp fishing knife.

Then he threw some salmon over the side of the boat. The mama whale began to swim closer.

 “I see what you’re doing,” said Elsie. “Can I help?”

“Thank you and yes,” came the answer. “Be ready to feed them more salmon.”

Tomas tossed another fish into the water and the tired mama whale drew even closer. He held a fish against the outside of the ship’s hull and slapped it several times.

Softly Tomas began to sing,

"Sea dancers lesp out of the ocean's deep,

Who know the secrets only rolling waves keep....

Playing where ocean blends into sky,

Where singing whales leap, dance and fly...

His soothing voice was partly a hum and a whisper. Elsie felt tranquility enfold her and she saw the whale approaching with her baby.

The calf rested trustingly on it's mama’s nose and blew a tall spout of air out of the blowhole.

Tomas could see their eyes now, looking at him and then into his face. He looked into the whale calf's eyes.

"I'm going to name you 'Sea Dancer,' and you are going to leap and fly over waves again today."

From deep within, Tomas brought all of his retained knowledge and intuition to the surface. 

There. He felt it. He was in the flow.

“I think I can do it,” he said to Elsie.

“Throw a few more salmon to the whale.”

Tomas saw the vines had town a large v-shaped tear in the baby whale’s dorsal fin. He stored this image away in permanent memory.

Minutes passed, the mama whale and her baby were only a few feet away. Tomas could see the vines on the baby’s fins.

“Keep feeding the whale, Elsie.”

While the mama grabbed fish and tried to keep holding up her calf, Tomas leaned over the low railing with is knife. His strong, knarled hands cut the vines. They fell off the baby.

Wiggling and then exploding with energy, the baby slapped her tail on the water, pushed off with her fins, and leaped away, breaching through the air. The mama surged forward and nuzzled her calf, then they sped away with leaps of freedom.

Years later, the legend of Tomas the Whale Speaker grew. The villagers painted a mural of the story on one of the eateries. Always humble, Tomas still entertained with his lute near the docks and his donation bowl, but he was too modest to sing of his mama River Whale and her baby.

Several times through the years when he saw a black and white “river whales” pod, Tomas recognized the dorsal fins of the mama and her baby, "Sea Dancer." Over time the calf grew and became an adult whale.

One summer, while he sang and played his lute in the village next to the river, he saw the dorsal fin with the large v-shaped tear again.

There was a six-month-sized calf at her side.

The whales were playfully leaping, tail flukes slapping the water, singing and speaking their unique dialect of squeaks, hums, and whistling in the family whale pod.