1940s France and Baby Lions

     I fell in love last week!  That lovely feeling of joy, amazement, newness, awareness; that desire to have the days and moments encapsulated in your blood; to feel your pulse race and your palms sweat and all of your senses come alive in a heartbeat.
    No, there's not a person in sight, just a beautiful novel and a trip to the zoo, and I was transported to that place that all lovers long for.  I know that may not make any sense to some of you.  But for those who cherish a well-written book and are lovers of animals, I think you might be able to relate to my enthusiastic response to these two wonderful events.
     On June 25th, after many months of hoping and waiting, our handsome Abuto and his lovely mate, Lomela, gave this world the most wonderful gift of three precious lion cubs - two males and one female.  Every week since their birth I have been at the zoo to watch them on the tv monitor set up near the indoor exhibit.  I could see them in the nursery area back behind the wall as they stumbled around each other and momma trying to find out about their new world.  Momma was always there to lick them and nurse them and carry them back into the den where she knew they would be safe from any dangers.
     This past week was the first time that the zoo keepers had arranged it so that Lomela could bring the babies out from the nursery and into the indoor exhibit area.  On Monday, she was not ready to show them to the world.  I waited awhile at the exhibit, which was blocked off at one end to prevent too many people from being close to the glass and scaring mom and the babies.  But no sign of Lomela and the cubs.

     When I went back on Friday my patience paid off.  I stopped by the lion area early in my visit and there was nothing going on.  A woman whom I often run into at the zoo had been there waiting all morning and said that Lomela had stuck her head out into the exhibit area, but then went back to where the babies were and had not come out again.  So, I decided to do my usual "rounds" of the other animals and then went back after lunch.  I waited and waited and waited . . . . 
     I felt important standing there as I could explain to all the other visitors why the area was blocked off.  Everyone was so excited that we had baby lions and were disappointed that they couldn't see them.  The lion keepers came and went and saw that I was planning to stay for awhile and they all wished me luck!

Mom is watchful!

     After an hour I saw Lomela peek her head out of the doorway into the nursery.  I guess she decided that I didn't look too threatening and so she came all the way out into the exhibit and trailing behind her were the five week old babies!!!  My throat closed up and my eyes teared and could not focus on anything except those precious babies.  I watched them for an hour - playing, wrestling, falling off the platforms as their little legs are still figuring out how to work, chewing on mom's tail, climbing onto her back, eventually nursing and falling asleep in a pile of fur.  I watched them long enough that I could tell them apart - with a little help from the keepers.

Babies are curious!

     Slowly, many of the keepers in other parts of the zoo came to see the babies.  Word got around (I'm sure the walkie talkies were very busy!).  And then lots of visitors got the word also - "The baby lions are out now!  Go and see them!".  While we were all busy watching the babies, Lomela was busy watching all of us.  When she first came out she stood on the platform and surveyed the area.  You can see that in my photo (and I apologize that I did not have my good camera with me, I used my phone).  She must have decided that she was ok with the situation, because she then went and laid down, but she never took her eyes off of the people!  The kids were oblivious, as kids often are, secure in the knowledge that Mom was there to take care of them.  They played for about 35-40 minutes and explored the area.  At one point Angie, who is their grandma, came up to a fenced area where they can "nose" each other.  None of the other lions has been in with the babies.  But Angie was very interested and you could tell she was "talking" to them.  One of the little ones spent a few minutes "nosing" grandma, or maybe he was just chewing on the bars!

Handsome Dad taken about a year ago

     When the keepers decided that Lomela seemed ok with all the people gathered around the blockade, they started letting a few visitors at a time come around the blockade to get a better view.  I was the first one they let in!!  What a treat!  They knew I'd been waiting for an hour and they wanted to reward me.  It truly was love!  What gorgeous creatures they are, even as babies.
     So now you're wondering about the 1940s France part of the title (or maybe you'd forgotten as I spent so much time talking about the baby lions!).  All the Light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr has been on the New York Times' Best Seller list for I don't even know how many weeks.  When I found out that the story takes place just before and then during the German occupation of France, I knew I had to read it.  What I did not realize is how much I would love it.
     It isn't just the plot that draws you in although that in itself is compelling.  Marie-Laure is a young girl at the beginning of the story who loses her eyesight and sees the world through the tiny miniature towns that her father builds for her - first, their neighborhood in Paris and then their neighborhood in Saint-Malo where they spend the German occupation.  At the same time as Marie-Laure is learning what it's like to be blind and to "see" the world through her other senses, a young orphaned German named Werner is finding out what it means to live in a world dominated by Nazi philosophy.  And as a radio technology genius he is much in demand as a servant of the Third Reich.
     But the reason I am so in love with this book is that it embraces the senses.  Doerr's writing is mesmerizing.  He helps you to see, feel, hear, taste, smell all that goes on in the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner during such a difficult time for both of them, their friends and families and their countries.
      As an old woman who has survived the war and is once again living in Paris:
          " Marie-Laure imagines the electromagnetic waves traveling . . .bending . . . a thousand times
     crisscross the air - maybe a million times more.  Torrents of text conversations, tides of cell
     conversations, of television programs . . . passing through buildings, arcing between transmitters
     in Metro tunnels, commercials for Carrefour and Evian and prebaked toaster pastries flashing
     into space and back to earth again. . . .and ten thousand I miss yous, fifty thousand I love yous,
     hate mail and appointment reminders . . . jewelry ads, coffee ads, furniture ads flying invisibly
     over the warrens of Paris, over the battlefields and tombs, over the Ardennes, over the Rhine,
     over Belgium and Denmark, over the scarred and ever-shifting landscapes we call nations.
     And is it so hard to believe that souls might also travel those paths?  That her father and Etienne
     and Madame Manec and the German boy named Werner Pfennig might harry the sky in flocks
     like egrets, like terns, like starlings?  That great shuttles of souls might fly about, faded but
     audible if you listen closely enough?  . . . . Every hour, she thinks, someone for whom the war
     was memory falls out of this world. . . . We rise again in the grass.  In the flowers.  In songs."

"Here H J Pilot, a law student, heroically gave his life at the age of 23 in the liberation of Paris August 20, 1944"

    And just as I had that lump in my throat and tears in my eyes for the new babies, I felt those same emotions reading this book.  Yes, I'm in love and it's a wonderful feeling!   So, come see the babies and find a copy of this book.  You may not fall in love with them as I did, but you will not be disappointed!
     Thank you for reading this post.  I took you on a different path this week, didn't I?  Who knows what next week will bring.  I think I will listen for the souls who might follow that path.