this morning at least four sea lions are languishing and barking on the pier under the tower bridge in old sacramento on the sacramento river, an inland waterway 86 miles by car (google maps doesn’t have a “travel by boat” option for directions) from fisherman’s wharf in san francisco where most of them hang out in the region. a bear was spotted in the city of west sacramento a few miles away.
in some of my circles and some of the news media people speculate on whether the covid-19 pandemic is somehow mother earth’s response to the ravages of climate change. the statesman journal: room for hope: viewing the covid-19 pandemic through the gaia hypothesis
this common dreams piece provides a particularly scholarly and thoughtful, if inconclusive, examination of the idea. is the covid-19 pandemic mother nature’s response to human transgression?
christian de quincey, one of my professors in graduate school, taught that if there was consciousness at any 
level of the universe, it had to be all the way down. he posited a “cosmic democracy” in the earth where the combined intelligence of trees, rocks, lakes, and, yes, viruses, given enough time and reason could “vote” for a different reality.
others in my close circle scoff at this idea, pronouncing it irrational and ridiculous.
i have absolutely no way of knowing what let alone why anything is happening here. to me it does not seem a huge stretch that the power that moves planets, moons or oceans could do whatever it wants (growing up near the beach, i’ve tried to fight tides and nearly drowned). what i do know is that this morning there are sea lions on the river and a bear in the city.