“I must be a mermaid, Rango. I have no fear of depths and a great fear of shallow living.” ~ Anaïs Nin.
We are born of water - its salt and brine are in our blood and veins. The tides work their constant ebb and flow on us. The waves wash over us - carrying us to distant shores from our island home through rough or calm oceans of great depths and vast expanse.
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| Annette Kellerman in Queen of the Sea, 1918 |
Our equatorial seas are warm and salty. clear and overflowing in bounty. Our fisher folk are sturdy, sinewy mortals steeped in the mysteries and myths of the first and oldest drop of water on earth. They traded and travelled the world back since continents were crossed by land bridges.
It is no wonder that we are daughters of the seas - wild and untamed, willful and free. We wander in wonder - exploring what the world has to offer, delighting in our own self discovery. We plumb the currents of countless coasts, we slither sleek and smooth through dreamtime, daydreams, and visions.
It is no wonder our power animal is a mermaid, at least one of them. These sirens of the sea - half-human, half-fish - legendary sea creatures chronicled in maritime cultures, ancient and ageless.
Although no evidence of aquatic humanoids has been found belief persists that we swam in oceans before we ever found a foothold on land.
The belief in mermaids may have arisen at the very dawn of our species. Magical female figures first appear in cave paintings in the late Paleolithic (Stone Age) period some 30,000 years ago - when modern humans gained dominion over the land and presumably began to sail the seas.
Atlantis, Lemuria, Mauritia, Thule - these lost lands still have their hold in our veins and lively imagination. Why, then, do they occupy the collective unconscious of nearly all seafaring peoples?
A question best left to historians, philosophers, and anthropologists? Or one best answered by questers, seekers, and dreamers? Who is to say? We can all dream up whatever we desire.
