#54 - The Horseshoe Crab
A lady friend of mine has a constellation of golden horseshoe crabs ascending the wall in her hallway. I've only seen it once, but it has stuck in my mind as a fitting display for so ageless a creature. If my memory is not tricking me, their golden-bright and ancient shapes wind in evenly graduated sizes off into the midnight blue of the heavens.
As they have done for millions of years, a multitude of horseshoe crabs is, this very moment, plowing our gravelly shores in pairs as they seek to perpetuate themselves for another eon. Their mating is a plodding, unfrenzied affair where two or more individuals attach themselves, one behind the next, and crawl along in tandem, ultimately depositing fertilized eggs in the gravel shore. Sometimes they occur in great numbers on a particular shoreline, but, other than the sight of so many at once, there is little else to betray their passion. Except for the occasional gentle sound of a shell scraping against pebbles, there is silence. Their crawling shapes at the water's edge are as enduring as the pebbles and the waves themselves.
Despite warnings about stepping on their upraised spiked tails with bare feet when I was a kid, I never in my life have found there was anything to fear from them. They are peace-loving and harmless creatures. Perhaps the greatest impact on mankind is the space they take up on the windowsills and mantels of seaside summer cottages. I can't say how many dried-out horseshoe crabs I have carried home by their tails over the years on my return from walks along the shore, but they would easily grace the mantels of a dozen cottages.
Just why the horseshoe crab has thrived so well for so long is hard to say, but it has managed to remain, virtually unchanged, for many thousands of centuries, and they've done it all by a primitive design and quiet habit that have somehow have escaped the notice of the forces of extinction. A fine example of the advantages of leaving well enough alone, the horseshoe crab has been on hand to witness the sunsets of countless seasons through the changing climates of ice ages and teeming swamps. In the pursuit of their own simple happiness, they have had the good fortune to land on the closest approximation of immortality that a living thing can hope to attain.
A key to the longevity of the horseshoe crab species is perhaps that there is little about them that has attracted the attention of any other than the casual beachcomber, who only rarely picks up the living specimen. Their shapely shells, it is true, have inspired an occasional artisan like my friend, and zoologists have marveled at their evolutionary success, yet they have even managed to evade severe exploitation by humanity until recently.
So, it was with great surprise that I one day came upon a man with a whole crate full of live horseshoe crabs. Such an unexpected sight immediately brought me to the conclusion that commercialism had finally befallen this ageless innocent, and I enquired of the man what earthly good was a crate full of horseshoe crabs. "Blood research," he said. It turned out that medical researchers have found some value in the blood of horseshoe crabs in connection with their studies of human blood, and they had need for a shipment of live specimens every now and then. (Horseshoe crab populations are now thought to be at risk!)
Although I forget the particulars of the conversation, I was impressed at the time by the odd pairing of human beings with so simple a life form. I could see no parallel in our separate histories save for our remote relationship with the cosmos. What more appropriate setting, then, could be arranged by a thoughtful artist living by the sea? This friend of mine has filled a space in her beautiful home with the graceful shapes of her seaside companions, trailing up, up and away to our only common denominator.