I encourage everyone to see this beautiful documentary, My Octopus Teacher. It follows a South African photographer, Craig Foster, as he copes with depression by free diving the local coast and forming a bond with a an unexpectedly charismatic common octopus (Octopus vulgaris). He visits daily for nearly a year, filming her nesting and playing, hunting and being hunted, gaining her trust and contact. The visuals are beautiful – the South African kelp forests could as easily pass for my own Pacific coast.

An octopus is clever – curious and playful (the scene of her playing with fish brought tears to my eyes). It fascinates me how this intelligence grew on a limb distinct and separate from us and our mammal cousins. Where we share kinship with the chimpanzee and dolphin, the octopus in her phylum is kith and kin with with snails, clams, and sea slugs.

I didn’t know what to expect when I started watching. What I got was a captivating dive into a life alien and wonderful.