Two years ago to day. What is it like to be a bat?

[Guest guest]

The naturalist Loren Eiseley wrote many interesting essays

on form shifting. In one of them, he relates a personal

experience he had while studying the habits of frogs.

On this particular night he was headed toward a deep sink

hole in the middle of a large grove. The sink hole was

particularly dangerous because it had not rained for months,

and the water had receded several feet from the steep rim.

Any careless human who plunged in would have no way to

climb out.

 

As he walked along a narrow trail, he was overtaken by a

a large number of frogs heading toward the sink hole.

He was enchanted to be part of this march, and tried

to keep pace with the frogs. After a few minutes of

feeling himself part of this amphian army, he

sensed a strange feeling of kinship with the

group. As they got nearer the water the frogs started

singing. Loren tells that at one point, to his surprise, he

noticed that he was no longer walking, but jumping along

and croaking with the frogs. He felt a great urgency,

a deep longing for those deep black waters. He wanted

it with a force he had never experienced before. This

yearning filled him with great exhilaration. He began

shaking with excitement and then the excitement

turned to terror as he realized that if he didn't break

this spell we would surely perish at the sink hole.

The terror did the trick, and he snapped out of his frog

trance.

 

To completely understand something is, in a way, to

become it. After total understanding, we can't no

longer exactly regain our former shape. That is why

there is an instinctual reluctance to understand too

deeply. We can't understand, and retain our former self.

 

Pete