There comes a time in the life of every man or woman when they ask themselves why their ancestors ever went to all the trouble of crawling out of the sea. The ocean has always fascinated me- the long, flat horizon, the hum of water against sand, and most of all the feeling one gets of being totally isolated from, while simultaneously instantly connected to, every other living thing on Earth.

They say the oceans were formed when an ice-giant careened recklessly out of orbit and crashed into Earth, like a galactic game of billiards with God running the table. I don’t know if that’s true, but if it is, I prefer to think of it as one planet embracing another, fully aware that the total of the two would be infinitely greater than the sum of their parts.