This is My Newsletter #20: Cara Tejpal

Hello,

It’s an oddly cool and overcast Sunday morning.  A soft blue light is filtering in through the windows, the cats are curled tight into perfect feline commas, my lover is bundled under blankets, fortressed by pillows. For the moment the city is quiet.

I’ve waited all week to write to you; perversely enjoying the growing dread of an unmet deadline. Yet I haven’t been entirely irresponsible.  In my mind I have picked and parcelled and stowed reccommendations; contemplated which aspect of myself to reveal to you. There is the temptation to indulge myself in a rant – it is so obvious, so easy, so apt.  This past decade has shown me some of the wounds we inflict upon the earth, and any one of them is worth investigating. But, I did that publicly in September, and I would like to limit my tolerance of my own sorrows.  

My heart is screaming to me that what I really want is to gift you a moment in my shoes. It sounds horrendously arrogant, but I don’t mean the banality of cleaning my teeth or clipping my nails. If you have spent enough time in Nature, you have been confronted with the delirious experience of awe. This is what I wish to give you. I have spent a lot of time in many different kinds of Nature, and I have been filled with awe.  It has shown me my place in the world,  buttressing me against the anxieties and depressions that plague our generation. I have gathered my awe-experiences carefully, and now I have a respectable and utterly private collection of them.  Like precious love letters they are unfolded and read as often as I need their solace.

In this collection is a memory that feels ephemeral as a dream. There we are, on an empty dirt track that mere moments ago was crowded with screaming, jostling men. The piercing trumpets and low rumble of elephants in distress occasionally ripping through the soundtrack of jeers and laughter. At dusk the mob disperses, and the herd of elephants hurry away. Now it's just us on the path, flanked on either side by thinning wilderness. We're weary and move slowly. Loading the car with camera equipment, speaking in whispers. The silence so sweet after the hours of abuse we documented. Night is upon us, and the colours are leached from my world. I see a silvery glimmer in the thicket. It grows sharper as first one and then another wild tusker walks ponderously onto the path. They stop momentarily to survey us. They are ethereal. I stand still and silent. The tuskers melt into the darkness. I am overwhelmed. I am in awe.  

I can not take you into my memories, nor can I take you to meet wild elephants. But I am determined that we lay a foundation for future awe together.  So here are my offerings. When you inevitably open Netflix today, watch My Octopus Teacher and find yourself submerged in a distant kelp forest. Later this week, find the BBC Earth Podcast on spotify and  learn why Teenage Elephants Need a Father Figure. On a Tuesday, when the drudgery of pandemic life feels overwhelming, carve out five minutes for Faraway Originals’ I Am Here. When you are nurturing your scientific temper, dive into this paper on Relations of Blood: Hunting Taboos and Wildlife Conservation in the Idu Mishmi of Northeast India. For easy eyecandy to share on your family whatsapp, checkout the Winners of Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2020.  In a moment of  lassitude, be soothed by Chasing Harsingars. While browsing for Christmas presents, perhaps consider these bar-headed geese from Pashoo Pakshee or snow leopards from SLT. On a babysitting date, maybe your ward will enjoy exploring Around a Tree Buttress.  Do you also work in conservation? Then I recommend you read why It’s Time to Stop Lionizing Dian Fossey as a Conservation Hero.  Unhappy with the crazed pace of a corporate job or city life? Siddharth Agarwal makes A Case for Slowing Down.  For little bursts of everyday awe and information on your Instagram, follow @pia.krishen , @neelimav and @sreedharelephas, and for a quick giggle watch wildlife biologist Aparna Krishnan’s Who Ate the Seeds?  2020 was a washout for most of us, but when you begin planning your next sojourn, throw Wildrift Adventures into the mix. Their tagline is “not the kind of holiday most people like”.  

Our phones are making us crazy. I know you know it too. So let me leave you to your Sunday to contemplate The Science of Awe and to consider that, in the words of Peter Matthiessen,  transcendence will be fleeting…

Love,
Cara
@carapiranha

P.S:  When the outdoors is inaccessible and awe seems impossible, I turn to nature writers. Here is a small selection of books, both fiction and non fiction, from my treasured nature library:

H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald

The Word for World is Forest by Ursula K. Le Guin

Wolf Totem by Jiang Rong 

The People in the Trees by Hanya Yanagihara 

The New Wilderness by Diane Cook

My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell

Eating Animals by Jonathon Safran Foer

The Wild Heart of India by T.R. Shankar Raman

In the Shadow of Man by Jane Goodall

Origins Reconsidered by Richard Leakey and Roger Lewin

Feral by George Monbiot