Dancing With Demons

"My hand is outstretched to a true Diablo Rojo. My heart is pounding. Had this giant ever seen man before? What does he want to know? Why isn’t he attacking me repeatedly like others before him? For twelve incredible minutes we circle, reach out, withdraw, touch, and test each other. His color flashes are never the same twice and he shows no fear of me. By this time I am being surrounded by up to 100 very large Humboldt squid, but they all stay away. Scar seems interested in my camera housing so I show it to him. He comes up and spread his arms completely over it and bites the lens, making for a nice shot of his beak and radula (a spike covered tongue) in action. Scar is so huge his arms engulfs the entire camera housing and reaches beyond it to lays upon my hands, forearms, and head. Scar tenses his whole body instantly as he detects the difference between the housing and me. A second later he withdraws and stops cold. His eye stares at my forearm and camera housing as if he realizes the difference for the first time. He flashes a unique pattern I have come to know. He flushes deep red then blanched bright white and stays that way for several seconds. The blanched white pattern has preceded many a retreat after attacks on me. What does this revelation mean to Scar? Whatever the reason for his blanched white reaction, his behavior changed. He begins a more purposeful series of circling and touching. Touching my arms, CCR cover, legs, fins (which he bites) and finally, my face.

It occurs to me that this might well be the first encounter of its kind for both species. I can only describe it as a dance. A dance of peace, curiosity and discovery.

Scar and I have just completed a dance of such beauty that my words fall far short of explaining it. Two intelligent beings from entirely different worlds, separated by extremes of morphology, behavior, space and time."
- posted by cjb @ 6:52 PM