The simple, stupefying truth that, as a woman, I am a minute ocean, in the dark tropic of whose womb eggs lay coded as roe, floating in the sea that wet-nursed us all, moved me deeply. Diane Ackerman Read Quote
We embrace two-legged beings, and can warm to four-legged beings, too, but for most people, six legs is pushing it. Most don’t need multi-eyed, antennaed face time. Diane Ackerman Read Quote
Even without seeing the crickets, grasshoppers, cicadas and katydids, we hear them shrilling in this season and trust that they’re the tiny living gargoyles entomologists claim. Diane Ackerman Read Quote
Cicadas, buckling and unbuckling their stomach muscles, yield the sound of someone sharpening scissors. Fall field crickets, the thermometer hounds, add high-pitched tinkling chirps to the jazz, and their call quickens with warm weather, slows again with cool. Diane Ackerman Read Quote
I’m fascinated how often and with what whole-heartedness people will risk their lives to perform acts of courage, sacrifice, and compassion for total strangers. Diane Ackerman Read Quote
I’m certainly not opposed to digital technology, whose graces I daily enjoy and rely on in so many ways. But I worry about our virtual blinders. Diane Ackerman Read Quote
Just as our ancient ancestors drew animals on cave walls and carved animals from wood and bone, we decorate our homes with animal prints and motifs, give our children stuffed animals to clutch, cartoon animals to watch, animal stories to read. Diane Ackerman Read Quote
As a species, we’ve somehow survived large and small ice ages, genetic bottlenecks, plagues, world wars and all manner of natural disasters, but I sometimes wonder if we’ll survive our own ingenuity. Diane Ackerman Read Quote
When a hurricane thrashes the mid-Atlantic, my hilly town often reaps the fringe of the storm. The rain starts blowing sideways, and sometimes we see hail the size of purie marbles. Diane Ackerman Read Quote
Brain scans show synchrony between the brains of mother and child; but what they can’t show is the internal bond that belongs to neither alone, a fusion in which the self feels so permeable it doesn’t matter whose body is whose. Diane Ackerman Read Quote
