The gift of eyes sighted by beauty

I heard from my father Bill Cohea yesterday that Timm's dontated eyes had been used in separate corneal implants, allowing two individuals an opportunity to regain their sight. So we can be comforted that Timm continues to share his vision -- perhaps merely as sight (surely a great gift for the blind), but who knows, maybe two people will continue to see beauty as he did. With surprise and gratitude and joy.

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For some reason the following story which I found on Timm's laptop fits with this news. Timm writes for The Slayton Mail about encountering a man whose life work was given to him through the eyes of a whale.

I think Timm found his own life's work, I believe, through some visual encounter -- sensing, perhaps, that God was staring back through some beautiful vista he had found in the lens. Timm's beautiful images live on with us, come from eyes which beheld God in His infinite beauty and majesty.

I'm not sure the pictures which accompany the following story are a direct match -- they're from a whale-watching event Timm attended sometime last year -- nor that the man in the picture is the same as the one he writes about: But the sense is close enough for this memorial, for remembering Timm's eyes, blue-green as the ocean he loved and twice as deep.

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WHALE STORY

Timm O'Cobhthaigh
2007

The directions that each of our lives take has always been a mystery to me. Some people just seem to know the road they are to take, while others wander for a time until they “fall” onto a path and follow it for the rest of their lives.

But sometimes, the path chooses us.

I recently spent a few days at the Oregon Coast kayaking when I ran into an elderly man doing what he seems to does best – talking about whales. After 30-plus years as a professor of marine biology at an Oregon university, he is now retired, but his passion for these magnificent creatures persists. How he came to spend his life studying them wasn’t by his design, but because the whales chose him.

It all started back in the summer of 1959 when he was camping at the Oregon coast near Depoe Bay. Back then he remembers the area as mostly woods with plenty of meadows to set a tent up in near the sea. Sunday morning found him laying in the sun next to his tent when he heard a swooshing noise coming from the direction of the ocean. Being at least aware of whales he knew that they were the source of the noise, and went to investigate. Prior to this, he confessed that he hadn’t thought much more about whales then he had about dogs, chickens or cows – they were just another animal to him. But all of that was about to change.

When her arrived at the waters edge he spotted four gray whales a few hundred yards offshore, feeding on the far side of a kelp bed. Amazed, he stood as still as he could, hoping to go unnoticed, but they spied him almost immediately. Once spotted, the largest whale of the pod swam leisurely towards him and turning parallel to the shore 10-15 feet from him, rolled on its side raising its enormous eye to his level and stared. How long the gray lay there studying him is unknown since the trance he was caught in was devoid of time.

Eventually, the big female rolled back on its stomach and swam off to rejoin the others. He figured she was telling them about him, because after a few minuets another one, a little smaller and younger than the first – swam towards him, pulled parallel 10-15 feet away, rolled on its side and stared. Once again he has no idea how long they stared at each other, lost in the trance . Finally it rolled back on its belly and rejoined the pod. Then another one about the same size did the same thing, followed by the youngest and smallest one.

Then the four repeated the same behavior again in the same order. When done with the second rotation they did it again and again until sunset. Then next morning, he jumped out of his sleeping bag and rushed down to the shore hoping that they would still be there. When he reached the waters edge the four were waiting, ready to repeat the events from the day before. All day the ritual repeated itself, the four swimming in, always in the same order, rolling on their side and staring, until the sun finally set.

The next morning thinking they would be gone he slept in, only to be awoken early by a crashing noise in the surf. Rushing back to the shore, he found the whales restlessly waiting, slapping their flukes against the water, agitated by his failure to appear. As soon as he showed up the rituals of the past two days began again. It was clear to him that he was the research project, the object of intense scrutiny. This was long before the advent of whale watching that provide contact between our two species. The next morning he got up and rushed down to the beach ready for a fourth day of study only to find they were gone.

Profoundly moved by the three days he spent in the whales’ presence, probed by what he saw as a inquisitive and intelligent mind, he felt compelled to learn all he could about them. He followed the scholastic routes of college and graduate school, eventually earning his doctorate in marine biology. For 30 years he roamed the oceans studying whales, specializing in trying to understand the intelligence he saw in their eyes so many years ago. Those eyes, the ones that seemed to bridge the distance between our two species and beckoned him to follow.