I wish I was a Narwhal

I wish I was a Narwhal. Swimming effortlessly through the cold Arctic waters. Listening to the ocean sounds peaceful in my Unicorn bliss. Greeting each day with endless moonlight . Enjoying the shortness of days through blue colored glass glancing up to the heavens glittered in stars. Great wonderment filling my soul each day unincumbered by humanity.

Oh, I wish I was a Narwhal, born with a smile on my rubbery face. I would create a life long pod filled with loyal friends with whom I would face each day together fearlessly. We would be far away from the modern world and live with simple needs and adventure the great depths of the oceans with joy and wonderment.

If only I were a narwhal, swimming through the great storms. Fearless to their power and ever changing the Arctic landscape. We would watch below the stirring waters patiently awaiting for the perfect moment to surface. I could escape into the darkness only to resurface to the light.

Why couldn't I be born a Narwhal and not born of human flesh. My voice would be song and not filled with bitter resentment. My life would be long and not shortened by strange disease. My love would be great and not broken. My life would be mine. My life would be all mine.

I wish I was a Narwhal. What a thought. What a beautiful, perfect, thought. Instead I am not. No I am not.

I am not a Narwhal. I was instead born me. Wonderfully imperfect me. I am but a mere piece of this great imagination. I get to sit in front of my typewriter and write my strange thoughts in mythical lore. I get to write what I think. I get to share and bare my soul on paper.

Thank God I am not a Narwhal. I have a husband and a daughter. I gave birth to this life that I get to watch each day grow into the most perfectly imperfect story teller. She is an extension of me and she is everything I am not. She is innocent.

Thank you God I was not born a Narwhal. I have traveled the world. I have drank aperol spritz from a rooftop in Kotor, eaten pasta in Roma, and walked the streets in Oxford in perfect wonderment. I have experienced all walks of life. I have seen ugly things. I have seen beautiful things. I have collapsed from exhaustion and have greeted the day in perfect rest.

If I had been a Narwhal, I would have never experienced Christmas mornings. Broken bread at Thanksgiving. Watched my parents hold hands and dance. Visited them both side by side where they lay together in the cemetery. I would have never experienced the beginnings of love or the endings. I can cry. Narwhals don't cry. What a sad idea.

The more I think about it, who would want to be a Narwhal? The Arctic is such a cold place. What a cold quiet place. I find the warmth of my home and the warmth of the hugs from my seven year old the only place I want to be. Not in the seas. No, I want to be here at home. I want to be sitting in front of my typewriter, wondering, what it would be like to be a Narwhal.

I want to live to be a hundred, not die by the age of fifty. As Narwhals who live a healthy life are lucky to be. I want to attend birthday parties, and weddings. and funerals to honor friends and family. I want to travel more, write more, and live more.

I want to surround myself with fascinating people. People who have lived extraordinary lives. I want to learn and share. I want to feed my soul. I would love to spend days with our daughter wandering the great museums of the world in search of mystery.

I want to hike great mountains, and wander through forests in search of wildflowers and strange rock formations. Perhaps we will search the beaches of the Carolinas for lost pirate treasure. Perhaps we will just lay in the sand bathing in the sun. That is something a Narwhal could never do. Sunbathe. A Narwhal can never live a human life. I see a Narwhal and know what a Narwhal is because I am human.

It is because of humans and their great efforts that Narwhals are no longer endangered. However, it was because of humans that they were endangered in the first place. I have to wonder how long that may last. The world is an ever- changing landscape. Humans are an ever- changing landscape.

I am optomistic, perhaps blind-fully so. I pray that Narwhals last forever. I pray in 3024 Narwhals are still doing their effortless Narwhal thing, living their greatest Narwhal lives and swimming blissfully through the Arctic. Watching the rainbow spectrum of the Aurora Borealis lighting their short nights. Counting the endless heavenly stars above. Diving down for a healthy buffet of shrimp and fish filling their bellies with no worry of going hungry. Living to fifty. Hell, living to sixty.

The Narwhal and myself have been given the great gift to live a life, filled with life. I don't think the Narwhal and I are so different. We both are just surviving. What the Narwhal doesn't know and what I don't know perhaps are very much the same. Perhaps. Or perhaps, the Narwhal knows more than I. Perhaps by the personal reflection the Narwhal has taught me a great lesson.

It's just a wonderful, gift to live. To live as perfectly imperfect me and he or she, the perfectly imperfect he or she which is and was born, a Narwhal.

Perhaps one day I will travel North and adventure out to find a Narwhal. If I am lucky enough, one might swim up to our boat. If I am that lucky perhaps the Narwhal and our eyes would meet. I wonder what that would be like. What a thought. What a beautiful and strange thought. Would he or she look back at me and in fact wonder to itself, what it is like to be me.

What a moment that would be.