TITLE: The Humpback's reach

DESCRIPTION: A split second before each of the humpbacks disappears beneath the surface, it tenses a moment, gracefully tucking its fifteen foot wide flukes inward and back, as if waving to all of us aboard the Lamarck. What does the motion express? In fact I am full of theories today, and imagine the tuck as the outward sign of a slow-motion orgasm humpback whales attain when they surrender to the sensuous underwater realm. If there's any truth to it, how easy to comprehend why the whale's ancestors fled the land sixty million years ago. The behavioral scientist standing next to me, Steve Templor, watches intently as I wave my wrist and hand like a Balinese dancer in imperfect emulation of the tuck. He takes off his gray knit cap to display white-blond hair curling wildly down his neck before it disappears below the collar of his flannel jacket. He strokes a pink bald spot on top. "It's a neat gesture, isn't it? "It seems orgasmic." He rolls his eyes, blows air over his lips. "When it gets really windy out here, I've seen whales hold their flukes aloft and actually sail down the Reach."(from The Charged Border by Jim Nollman [Holt])