The Goddess of Octopi

True story.

Between my junior and senior years of high school, I was invited to the west coast of the U.S. for a summer to take a college course in oceanology. For a landlocked gal growing up in south-central Pennsylvania, this was a dream! Living outside Los Angeles for most of a summer? Learning all about my favorite bodies of water? Sign me up!

My parents were more than generous with this opportunity. Flying out on July 4 and seeing fireworks from above as we came in for a landing is still an enduring memory for me. Mom did all the things for me that I couldn't as a teen - buying the flight tickets, flying with me, renting a car, getting me to the college, getting me and my stuff settled in, flying back home solo. And there I was, greenie kid thrown into what seemed to me to be the grown-up World of Collegia. (I know. Humor me, willya?)

I had so many fun experiences while there: snorkeling off the coast of Catalina Island and listening to the clicking of the mantis shrimp far below, watching the flying fish popping out of the wave crest at the bow of our research vessel and skimming the water to dive in when they thought they were safe, waving back at a huge ocean sunfish lazily floating along and waving its fin at us. Playing beach volleyball under the tutelage of former Olympic coaches turned oceanology teachers, learning so much that I was given the chance to try out for my college team a few years later. Seeing creatures brought up from the deep sea fumaroles that were just discovered, and being able to touch them.

And then I became the semi-hemi-demi goddess of octopi.

I didn't mean to. It's not even listed as an option in the job index.

(And yes, I know, "octopuses" is the preferred official term. They're MY minions, and I will go with the Latin formation of the word, so nyah.)

One of our field trips was to go behind the scenes of one of the famous aquaria out there. (See what I did there? Nyah again.) No, not that one, the second most famous. Instead of just visiting the aquarium, we got a behind-the-scenes tour, explaining all the stuff that happens where the tourists can't see, and for the most part don't care. We found it fascinating, all the chemical and calibration aspects that go into keeping water creatures as comfortable and fed as they can be on dry land.

The best part was being shown the room where they had all these cool critters that were being prepped to go on display to the public. Set in a warehouse attached to the aquarium, each tank was an oasis for the creatures inhabiting them. Our tour guide / instructor only gave us one rule: "Interact with them however you like, just don't bang on the glass." We nodded. Even light tapping on the glass is like putting a bell over a person's head and slamming it with a hammer like in the old cartoons, and these little guys were already stressed enough about their new environment. We were here to help, not make it impossible for their public debut.

So we scattered. Most of the group was following one particular fellow who thought he was charismatic enough to capture the attention of whatever creature he chose. Me, with my awesome top-of-the-line Minolta camera (thanks, Dad!), hung back a little, checking out each tank and the creature within. I'd stop, read the sign, spot the critter, wave, and see what happened. If there was a photo opportunity, I'd take the pic, then move on with a goodbye wave. That M.O. hasn't really changed much since for me; it's quite effective.

The group spread out even more, and I was next to last. Only Wendy was still behind me, and she was a shy thing from the start. (My scaring the crap out of her with a spur-of-the-moment joke early on didn't help either, and you better believe I apologized often and repeatedly for rattling her that badly.) She was watching me, though I didn't know it at the time. So there I was, looking, waving hello, sometimes pic taking, talking softly to the creatures, thanking them for the pic, waving goodbye and moving on. I knew she was back there, and kind of also waving as well, but I didn't notice much else. I was in my own little world.

Then, I reached the moray eel tank. Now, the card was very clear in that this guy was incredibly shy, and to be gentle with him. I know, gentle with a moray! So I peeked in - then had to bend all the way down, and do a bit of a twist to see him way in the back, hiding behind a chunk of coral. I waved. No reaction.

I decided to try for a picture anyway. As I lined up the lens with the tank glass, I softly asked, "Can I take your picture?" And there was a blur, and suddenly there was a rather large moray right in front of me! I certainly didn't waste the opportunity, I framed the pic and said, "Smile!"

And the moray - smiled.

I think he did, anyway. Any way you look at it, either I had a English-to-moray translator for a split second, or the otherwise shy moray was a photobomber two decades before the word was coined, or the moray yawned while completely surrounded by oxygen-rich water. But those moray jaws opened, and while they were open, I snapped that pic. I said "Thank you!" cheerily, and waved as I moved on.

And I heard a gasp behind me, and Wendy scampered away.

Hunh? Now, I also have excellent hearing (I can hear bats squeaking), and in a warehouse only full of water burbling and students talking quietly it did not take much to hear her whispering to our fellow students what she saw happen. "She can talk to the fish!" was repeated and spread, with the story of what happened, and with what particular tank. The instructor was lurking, listening as well, and it wasn't long before the whole blasted group tried to sneak around behind me, to make their own observations.

I completely ignored the whispers and shuffle-shuffle as I (then they) wandered from tank to tank, waving hi and taking a pic or two. Some creatures reacted, some didn't, but I thanked them all and moved on.

And came to the last tank, on the far side. Conversation stopped.

This last, and biggest, tank, only housed one thing: dozens of baby octopi. About an inch long each, no coral, no rocks, no shells. Just laying on the glass floor like they were bored out of their frigging tiny minds. They probably were, in retrospect.

You see, this was right at the beginning. Only recently to this story occurring did someone propose that the eight-leggers might have more than a few smarts tucked into their soft bodies. The first experiments had barely been started, much less published. So there, at the edge of a tank farm which might as well be an abyss leading to outer space, they lay with no stimulation or toys beyond set feeding times. In the darkness of the empty room beyond, you could see the tools and materials of the half-built maze that the researchers would eventually run them through.

I stared at the tank, the ennui, the tiny little eyes glittering in the gloom's edge, the form of the maze well sunk in the same gloom. I thought for a moment.

Anything but tap on the glass, right?

So I waved first. I got a few eye quirks, so they saw the movement. I assumed that was the equivalent of a few octopi saying "Hey." "Sup." "Yo." "Yeah, I see ya there."

I glanced up at the top of the tank - no lid. So I reached up, and stuck my finger in the water, and wiggled it like a worm.

One octopus - ONE - of those dozens perked up. While all the rest stared - humans included - he "stood up" on his tentacles to see this new thing better. And in front of everyone, jetted up to my finger, and gently wrapped himself around it.

The gasp behind me took the oxygen right out of the room. It felt that way to me, anyway.

I pulled my finger out, held him close to my eyes. There was no fear in this little one; he was holding his breath and wanted to see me closer too. I tilted him back and forth to catch the light on his skin, and blurted, "You are just the cutest thing EVER!" And gently reached up into the tank again, put my finger in the water, and he let go and floated back down to his spot in the tank.

I also floated off in a happy daze. The instructor was laughing, and the rest of the group couldn't stop talking about what just happened. I don't remember much about the rest of the day, or the tour, I kept replaying that interaction over and over in my mind as the amazing thing that it was.

Of course I didn't take a picture. I'd forgotten that there was a camera around my neck. All I was focused on was the tiny being wrapped around my finger, trusting me in an atmosphere that would kill it if left there too long.

I've told this story often over the years. Many times, I've joked with friends - what was it like for that little octopus? Did he go back and excitedly tell the others, "I just saw GOD! She called me the cutest thing ever!!!" Did that start an octopus change in religion? I referred to myself jokingly as the semi-demi-hemi goddess of octopi.

I'm not laughing anymore.

I've been reading about kleptogenesis, and how some researchers suspect that octopi as well somehow "borrow" DNA samples from those they come in contact with. I didn't stay in touch with the researchers, because we didn't know all the things that we know today about cephalopods. The instructor reassured me that all these subjects would be put back in the ocean where they were collected when they were done running the maze. But that means they knew where they were collected, and could return again and again for their progeny.

What I know for sure is this:

I've been to many fine aquaria over the years, and always make sure to check out the tank that houses their octopus if they have one. And in every single case, the octopus is either hiding in the back sleeping, or has been taken off display.

Except this once.

Decades later, my parents and husband and I took a trip to Florida. I collect elongated souvenir pennies, and most zoos and aquaria have at least one machine. So off we went, and they had three of the cephalopods in side-by-side tanks. Hubby and I waved to the cuttlefish, who then went into a chromatophore chat session of rippled color that was fascinating, but disturbing because I don't speak color pattern. They looked like gossips over a spot of tea. Then the chambered nautilus, who waved a tentacle or two when we waved. Or maybe it was just the tank's water jets playing tricks with our mind.

And again, with the octopus in the next tank, he was curled up and far away as all the others, tucked behind a coral outcrop.

Same species, by the way, as my little cutie from so long ago.

I placed my hand on the tank, and turned to my husband, and said jokingly, "I wonder if they remember I'm their semi-demi-hemi goddess?"

BAM.

I looked back, and that octopus had SLAMMED himself against the glass. He'd splayed out so that his eight tentacles were mimicking my five fingers, and the tips of each tentacle were rippling and twirling in a language I couldn't understand, but he desperately wanted me to know something.

I'm sorry, little one, your alleged goddess is an idiot.

I started crying, and I scrunched my hands a little, which got him even more excited and those tentacle tips wriggled even faster in designs that were complex and beautiful. I pulled back finally and stroked the glass, and he bobbed and jetted back to the safety of the coral he'd been hiding behind. We moved on, and as I turned, there was a security guard standing there with his mouth hanging open.

I smiled weakly. With tears still in my eyes, I said, "You got him from [a particular aquarium in California], didn't you?" And we walked on, leaving him to pick his jaw off the floor.

Cephalopod researchers, if you're reading this, whether you've heard this story from your fellows or not, it really happened. I've always wondered if I accidentally skewed the data from the beginning. If you have a lonely octopus who needs cuddles, I'm here. I'd love to tell my minions again and again that they are the cutest things ever, even though we've learned to put the covers on the tanks by now.