By Bernie Bell

Recently, Mike was in St. Abbs (near Edinburgh) for a meeting. He was up and out early one morning, down to the beach before the meeting started. He was walking along behind a hedge, when, just ahead of him, as the path opened out, he saw a young Roe Deer. She stopped and looked at him, he looked back at her.

By Kristian Pikner from Wikimedia Commons

She calmly turned and wandered on, the same way Mike was going, so he wandered on, too.  Then, at a certain point, she changed direction – she actually turned and looked at him again, then went her way, and he went his.

He told me this, when he got home. One of those times, when we meet with the wild things, face to face, eye to eye, on equal terms, no fear – some curiosity.  Magic. Connecting.

Years ago, we were working at the Cota Doñana nature reserve, in Spain, had gone for a stroll in the evening, and this happened –

 The Lynx

 Walking by, stopped, frozen –

“What is it?  Will it hurt me?  Can I eat it?”

Continues cautiously –

“You never know, with humans.”

 We looked at the Lynx, the Lynx looked at us, all thinking much the same things – living – connecting. Then we each carried on our way.

An Iberian Lynx, nearly driven to extinction by…..us.

Stay connected.