Change is the constant in this world

And now into the article …
Break times such as lunch or smoko are often a welcome relief if you’ve been out digging trenches in the summer heat. Not as religious as they used to be, but they can still be part of the construction site.

Depending on the worksite, workers would have different ways of enjoying their break – some crews pull together a few crates and sit around to chat with their prepared lunches and hot drinks from the good ole thermos, some eat on the run, and some crews head to the local for a short stint on the horses or trots. Others such as crane drivers would typically stay up in their cabins which might mean they need to urinate in a bottle and bring it down at the end of their shift (some leave a bucket in the cabin just in case).

On those sites where I was working inside and on my own, I’d often head out to enjoy the weather and to also snoop my way through the ‘wilds’ of the balcony, backyard or even letterbox to see if I could find some wee critter such as a bug, spider, bird or even lizard doing their thing.

Of particular interest with these forays were the invertebrates and so with a curious glance I’d set out to discover more of their fascinating characteristics whilst putting on my interpreter’s hat to ponder what story I’d be sharing if I were in a position of facilitating an interpretive experience of the same.

The segmented invertebrates
Most of the invertebrates I came across were insects and spiders which belong to the Arthropod group of invertebrates.

The first characteristic of these animals is that they all have an exoskeleton, i.e. a hard and protective layer on the external of the animals.

This layer is a tough coating made of overlapping layers of chitin (same material as fingernails) and beyond its visual features and characteristics, does an amazing job of protection, provides an anchor for muscles and the like, helps to avoid the animal drying out, and all the while being a barrier to pesty microorganisms.

The dark side to all these benefits is that when the animal wants to grow, the exoskeleton does not. And so, in the philosophy of yin and yang, light and dark, and the everyday truth of where there’s an upside there’s a slippery downslide … life with an exoskeleton can suck.

So how does an animal grow if they’re restricted by this exoskeleton? And the short answer is that the hard and inflexible outer layering ‘has to go’ … i.e. time to moult.

And it’s not as if this moulting is as simple as slipping into the local 2nd hand clothes store for a new pair of jeans and top? Yeeahhh …. NAH! nada!

With the process of moulting, the animal stops eating, sometimes even stops breathing for a time, and gets its new exoskeleton ready before ‘exiting’ the old exoskeleton. All whilst avoid being eaten during this somewhat vulnerable period, exhausting and dangerous period.

And it doesn’t just happen now and again. Spiders for example, they can moult up to once a month when in their youthful growing years and slow to once every year to two in their older years.

The trap door spiders I’d often come across belong to a group of spiders that live the longest, with the oldest being 43 years old – that’s a lot of moulting. And to quote from Dr Samantha Nixon from the University of Queensland, spiders shed everything … ‘even their fangs’.

Another animal we often associate with this moulting process is that of the cicada (of which there are over 3000 species in Australia). Most of us would have come across discarded cicada shells in our time mucking around the local park, heading into bushland areas or even in backyards. These animals have been around for approximately 200 million years … at a time when Australia was still sharing its southern shorelines with Gondwana and they sure make their presence known when comes time to put out the mating call.

This mating call is only made by the male and can reach sounds at ear screeching (and painful) volumes of 120dB (in comparison a chainsaw is around the 110db range). And whilst it might seem incredibly loud, some animals make an even louder sound with the Blue Whale being able to call at around 190db.

And there’s also the Tiger Pistol Shrimp (sometimes called the snapping shrimp) which produces and ‘shoots’ bubbles that when pop, can produce a sound up to 220db and generate heat at over 4000degC. Not bad for an animal that is only about 5cm in length.

Human skin and how it fuels household biota
This shedding of an ‘external layer’ is something we humans share with these backyard invertebrates, albeit we shed our outer layer of skin on a more gradual and continuous basis. Research suggests we shed approximately 30,000 to 40,000 skin cells per hour – so go to bed at night and you’ll be half a million skin cells lighter by morning. The same research suggests that we will shed up to 3½ kgs of dead skin within our lifetimes.

Within our households, that dead skin becomes a constant source of food for one of the most common tiny critters found in our homes — the house dust mites. Whilst the name hints at it being an insect, it’s actually an arachnid (those group of animals that include spiders) and in terms of how common they are, let’s just say there are a few zeros in that number.

Dust mites break down and digest all our dead skin, before the same becoming small bits of poo that they ‘contribute’ along with material from their own shedding activity. And this wonderous other world doesn’t stop there, as there are a host of other lesser thought of animals that also shed their exoskeletons including insects like maggots, the house fly, cockroaches and beetles. Together with our dead skin, the trail of existence from these critters comprises the bulk of the dust that is sucked up by your vacuum cleaner – and if you’ve pets, then your vacuuming efforts might also include sucking up the fur they leave behind.

What’s that ole adage about the 7 second rule … and how if you drop some food, you’ve a few seconds to pick it up … yep, and in that time, you might well enjoy a heap more goodies than what was initially dropped.

Dah dah … and taking change to a whole new level
So far we’ve chatted about shedding and moulting within the context of animals losing an ‘exterior layer’, typically as part of a growing phase and / or renewal of this layer.

At differing stages of development some invertebrates go through the full monty and experience “complete metamorphosis” with a body transformation that reviles Arnie in the Terminator or perhaps Bumblebee in Transformers. The fact that metamorphosis comes from the Greek for transformation or change in shape gives us a hint.

The classic example of this would be the butterfly which after hatching enjoys living life as a soft-bodied ‘grub’ … i.e. caterpillar. It eats, grows and sheds its skin as it gets older and bigger … and they sure do get bigger with estimates suggesting they can increase in size up to 3000 times. Once all this growing reaches its end stage, the caterpillar stops eating to become a pupa, which is a phase that helps protect the caterpillar as it changes into a butterfly.

Whilst butterflies might seem a delicate little critter, they sure pack a cognitive bruise when we pause to admire how they engage with the world.

First up, butterflies also have sensory cells on their feet (among other places), so when they land on something, they can instantly “taste” whether it’s a food source or not. They use this at times to taste rotting meat, given this can be one of their sources for nutrients.

Another amazing quality is how the eyes of a butterfly are actually a multitude of smaller eyes called ommatidias, which enables the butterfly to see within an arc of approximately 300 degrees. They can also ‘see’ UV light, with the ultraviolet part of the electromagnetic spectrum being an important means by which butterflies and flowers communicate. Flowers seeking to ‘court’ butterflies will display their goodies of nectar using ultraviolet light, which is ‘seen’ by the butterfly and when comes down to land and enjoy the nectar pollination takes place.

Whilst we’re chatting about ultraviolet light, a few years ago research revealed that when UV light was shone on the fur of a platypus it displayed biofluorescence, which is when a surface absorbs and re-emits light as a different colour. Whilst this is widespread in other animals like fish, amphibians, birds and reptiles, this was the first display of biofluorescence by monotremes.

Why all this talk about shedding and moulting and metamorphisis
Because during those ‘wild forays’ around different worksites it got me thinking about people and whether we also carry around an exoskeleton, despite the biological fact we have an internal skeleton. The context of this relationship between humans and an exoskeleton is metaphoric, an analogy for whether we are restricted by our habits, attitudes, beliefs and other qualities – in the same way an outdated exoskeleton can restrict the growth of an invertebrate.

Influencing behaviour vs changing behaviour … reframe or just semantics?
It also got me thinking about our role as interpreters and our interpretive intent with an identified audience. Are we just about refreshing a few skin cells, or perhaps influencing the shedding of a layer or are we instead going for the full-on behaviour change outcome?

This focus on influencing change has been the enjoyable focus of many a philosophical tussle during conversations around behaviour change. And where sometimes people see behaviour change as a distinct change of behaviour, I see it as more of an invitation to entertain certain values. And so, my quest as an interpreter is to create a compelling experience with a just as compelling invitation to adopt a certain behaviour. Perhaps the person isn’t quite ready to shed and if not, we respect that and learn how to better our experiences and the associated invitations. And then you might enjoy moving moments when a recipient is ready and interested and you get to witness them experiencing the joy of personal revelations.

It might seem a semantic discussion and just a guised excuse for a convoluted discourse to empty wine and beer bottles. I see it as two different approaches employing similar psychological and behavioural principles.

As a coach of two junior footy teams, I know the best way to influence the behaviour of the teenage kids I coach is to create the conditions under which a player comes to their own realisation on how they need to change the way they’re playing. I can ask them to play in a particular way when attacking from a certain area of the field, seeking to turn the shoulder of a defender before making a blind side run, or how to shift back into a cover defensive role, blaaa blaaaa blaaaa.

And this even applies when teaching the nuance within a skill. If they come to the realisation themselves then it’s typically a more empowering and longer-term outcome of learning. And this is invariably done by guiding them through a journey of self-discovery based on the use of questions vs telling them via instruction. There is a difference between teaching and helping a person learn.

Beyond coaching teenagers with raging hormones and back to the wider interpretive world, the following are a few simple examples of elements we might be using to form up our exoskeletons and suggestions on how we can build from these to enrich our on-going realities.

Challenging and extending on our use of labels
What labels are we living by? For a historic analogy Australia has been referred to by a variety of labels that include:
• Australia
• Strayla
• terra australis incognita
• Terre Australe
• Unknown Southern Land
• Australis
• New Holland … with variations such as Nova Hollandia and Nouvelle Hollande (reflection of the Dutch landings along western shores … and Abel Tasman’s naming)
• New South Wales (by Lt Cook / Captain Cook and albeit more the eastern half) … later tweaked to Colony of New South Wales

Each of these labels carries a story of perception, identity and understanding. And what about if we were to nudge this further and say that Australia was also once called Ulimaroa. Whilst you might not know of this previous name for Australia (as included in maps such as the one below), you might still find yourself curious to explore the why and when around the use of this name.

And therein lies the reason why labels can often seem like a paradox – in that they can both begin a journey whilst also punctuating the same.

To be childish or to experience neotony
If I were to share the label of childish you might suddenly evoke all manner of things, generally led by our assumptions, attitudes and beliefs. And in the main we’d pause at whatever our relationship was with the label of childish, thereby restricting additional perspectives. As per the old saying that what we look for is what we find.

If instead I mention the label of ‘neotony’ as used by Glenn Capelli, the great educator from Western Australia, there might just be the opportunity to entertain your attention as you wonder at what this word means – which as Glenn describes as ʻthose childlike behavioural traits of spontaneity, creativity, exploration and living with a sense of wonder … and through these continue to help ourselves and others grow in the same way these childlike qualities served us so well in our younger years.’

Spider venom that saves vs kills
How do we frame a perspective and how can we reframe the same to enjoy newer perspectives. Heading back to our discussion on spiders and how I’ve been learning about the value of their venom within medical and biotechnological applications such as eco-friendly insecticides, stroke treatments and antiparasitic drugs.

Tales within the ripples
There’s always a constant companion whenever yet another birthday rolls along to herald the fact that I’m year older. And that’s change. Change is the constant in this world we live in. In this world of flux. Things are forever changing – yesterday is not today which in turn is not tomorrow. And yet, we often bring our suitcase of yesterday’s things with us to shoehorn into the reality of tomorrow vs looking to shed some of those historic goodies and honour their use by dates. And yep, it can sometimes be a blwdy tough ask and sometimes it sucks with bolts of pain as the symptoms.

Things change … and whilst some of our days might be long, before long we realise the years were short … and so my invitation is that when we can, let’s shed a little, get playful and embrace the precious along the way.