IN HER ELEMENT

When someone is so good at something it seems natural to them it is said that, ‘she is in her element.’

Fish swim in water because it is what they were born to. Birds fly in air because it is what they were designed for.

Mammals have on their own moved from being land animals to flying in air, swimming and every intermediary way of living imaginable. So much so that maybe other descriptive verbs should be developed. The movement of even the most graceful fish does not compare to the movements of dolphins or whales. Still needing to breathe air, such mammals understand water as a celebratory choice. Even otters have a special sense of being in water unequaled by any other animal.

Remember mudfish or eels moving about on land; they do it, they do not glory in it.

This time of year bats return to the evening sky over Naples, and watching their maneuvers, acrobatics, is the first joy of early spring. They do not fly. They move in air as though they understand something about air and wings; some possibilities of how to be with skill, how to live with skill. As a horse or cheetah does running on land, a monkey or squirrel does free-wheeling in branches.

Bats are in their element in the air. As we sit down to lunch they dream and plan their next tricks.