May 25, 2004
BRAVEHEART DIDN'T END TOO WELL EITHER, FOLKS:
Vigil held for slain lion: ORGANIZER HOPES FOR `HEALING' AFTER SHOOTING THAT SHOOK COMMUNITY (Julie Patel, 5/25/04, San Jose Mercury News)
Monday night there was a vigil for the mountain lion that wandered into Palo Alto last week and was shot by police."What it evoked in the community was a feeling of sadness,'' said Larissa Keet, a psychotherapist who was a teacher in the Palo Alto Unified School District for 20 years and who organized the vigil. ``I felt a vigil was something that could help with all of those range of sentiments that get aroused and that we could somehow channel those feelings to provide healing for all of us.''
Six people formed a circle around a photo of a mountain lion and two American Indian Zuni fetishes -- miniature animal-shape sculptures believed to embody the spiritual force of a soul -- in a grove of redwood trees at Rinconada Park.
Let's be honest here--what wouldn't you give for its mate to have shown up and mauled them? Posted by Orrin Judd at May 25, 2004 1:15 PM
When you go somewhere to get closer to Nature, remember that at the same time Nature gets closer to you.
Because most people's contact with Nature is well managed and at most in one week chunks, they get the impression that Nature is loveable and cute and cuddly and a place everyone lives happily ever after. During my times doing field work in a large, famous National Park, it was amusing to observe people's reactions to seeing those things that never seemed to get included in the PBS or National Geographic travelogues. Often it was a demand that "something" be done to save a dying animal, or hide the carcasses, not realizing that carnivores, predators and scavengers have to eat too. (The best way to describe a bison that's rotting on thermal ground 200 meters upwind is to say that is smells like rancid caramel.)
Posted by: Raoul Ortega at May 25, 2004 1:47 PMHad the lion's mate shown up, would it not have been "Let the Tiger Out of the Cage, West Coast Edition?"
Posted by: Mike Morley at May 25, 2004 3:09 PMMike:
Very good as well as a key plot twist in Prince of Tides.
Posted by: oj at May 25, 2004 3:18 PMMr. Judd: That reminds me of a story awhile back about a group of enviromentalists releasing two seals to the wild that they had rescued and raised. As the group watched the seals swim about their boat, a great white shark appeared beneath one and ate it. To the group's horror, the shark quickly turned about and ate the other one, too. Nature, it isn't pretty.
Posted by: Buttercup at May 25, 2004 4:34 PMThe day will come when prudent men don't venture into the wild with less heat than an S&W 40 and most folks will live in walled cities.
Posted by: Robert Schwartz at May 25, 2004 6:01 PM"Let's be honest here--what wouldn't you give for its mate to have shown up and mauled them?"
A hundred bucks at least! :-)
Posted by: Kay at May 25, 2004 6:16 PMI can tell they've never had a maneater in Palo Alto; like the one we've had down in Silverado Canyon.
But then, man-eaters are just excising human cancer-cells from the Sacred Body of Mother Gaia...
Posted by: Ken at May 25, 2004 6:19 PM