Beta
I was up on the mountain on a walk trying to get some clarity, I guess about what to do. I sat down on this log, and lo and behold a little echidna comes waddling along, and sticks its nose right into the log where I was sitting to feed on ants.
We just sort of sat there together - this echidna snuffling around eating ants, and me sitting there in a moment of contemplation.
I realized that the echidna and I were not so different.
Echidnas spend their entire life solitary. The mother echidna lays one egg, and as soon as that puggle hatches, it's left for up to two weeks at a time by itself in the burrow. The mum comes back, gives it a feed and goes off again. And then eventually, once the puggle is grown up, it'll leave the burrow, and it's solitary for the rest of its life. And yet the echidna seems very content.
It was a part of that place, and that's exactly where it belonged. It didn't seem to be worried that it was by itself.
And it just gave me this incredibly deep sense of assurance that I would be okay, and that even if I was alone, I was never really alone. Because I had my echidna friends, and my bird friends, and my tree friends, and I was a part of the place.
I think I owe a lot to that echidna, for coming and sitting next to me on that day because it set me on a path to the most beautiful life.
Rose Fuggle
PhD candidate in microbial ecology
I was up on the mountain on a walk trying to get some clarity, I guess about what to do. I sat down on this log, and lo and behold a little echidna comes waddling along, and sticks its nose right into the log where I was sitting to feed on ants.
We just sort of sat there together - this echidna snuffling around eating ants, and me sitting there in a moment of contemplation.
I realized that the echidna and I were not so different.
Echidnas spend their entire life solitary. The mother echidna lays one egg, and as soon as that puggle hatches, it's left for up to two weeks at a time by itself in the burrow. The mum comes back, gives it a feed and goes off again. And then eventually, once the puggle is grown up, it'll leave the burrow, and it's solitary for the rest of its life. And yet the echidna seems very content.
It was a part of that place, and that's exactly where it belonged. It didn't seem to be worried that it was by itself.
And it just gave me this incredibly deep sense of assurance that I would be okay, and that even if I was alone, I was never really alone. Because I had my echidna friends, and my bird friends, and my tree friends, and I was a part of the place.
I think I owe a lot to that echidna, for coming and sitting next to me on that day because it set me on a path to the most beautiful life.
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