A few weeks after our ecological trip to Kinmen Island in July 2023 to look for horseshoe crabs, I was listening to an audio book called The Story of My Life by Helen Keller. She lost her sight and hearing after a bout of illness when she was 19 months old. Her teacher, Anne Sullivan, taught Keller to speak, read and write. While a student at Radcliffe College, Harvard University, she wrote an autobiography detailing her early life.
I was almost asleep in my bed, listening to her memories boringly recited in a formal male voice, when suddenly I heard the story of a horseshoe crab. The observations of our group being in search of these ancient creatures intertwined in my mind with the impressions of a blind and deaf little girl more than 100 years ago. The horseshoe crab, accidentally or not, linked us all across continents, time and history.
Here is my video sketch about this experience:
