personality

I can’t tell you how many times I have wished that Jamie would just go to bed.

On a typical day, we close off the chimps’ outdoor habitats around the time that they bed down for the night in the greenhouses and indoor playrooms. Given the sanctuary’s relative proximity to a public road and the unfortunate abundance of rattlesnakes in the area, we require at least two staff members to be on duty at the chimp house when the chimps are in the habitats so we can respond promptly to an emergency. Diana and I are on site nearby overnight, but we need to sleep, too.

If the chimps decline to go to bed after dinner, and instead decide to stay outside, the staff put in a little overtime. For most of the year, shorter days and cooler nighttime temperatures discourage late-night outdoor activities. But summer demands them.

Jamie has always had unique ways of exerting control over her caregivers. Some are obvious, like a spit in the face or a well-aimed handful of feces. Others are more subtle. Most nights, Jamie has a list of last-minute demands as we are closing up for the night. It could be a favorite pair of boots or a page torn from one of her books about bonobos. It’s not the items themselves that matter; if it were she could easily ask for them earlier in the day. It’s her way of deciding when the workday is over.

We’ll do just about anything to get Jamie what she needs before bed, but we could still close the chimp house door and walk away if we were so inclined. Not so when the chimps are on Young’s Hill. Jamie has been here for 17 years. She knows the rules, and how to use them to her advantage.

There have been summers when Jamie would keep us late almost every day of the week. If we were lucky she’d let us off after a couple extra hours. Other times we’d be here until 10pm, with only the moon to light our paths. And by late summer, after months of these long workdays, we’d be praying for Jamie to lose just a bit of her stamina. As we’d crest the top of Young’s Hill on our third or fourth walk of the evening, I’d look down to see the glow from my living room window. I’d imagine sitting down to dinner or sipping a cold beer on the porch. I’d imagine climbing into my own bed.

But with the flick of her wrist, Jamie would insist that we march onward.

Jamie was a walking machine then. Her record was 14 laps in a day, which adds up to about 3.5 miles up and down a hill with a more than 100-ft elevation gain. These days she rests more. She’ll make us wait while she climbs a tower and watches the sun set over the mountains. I don’t know if she’s gained more of an appreciation for the natural beauty of our surroundings or if she just needs an excuse to catch her breath. Perhaps it’s just another control tactic. Whatever the reason, these are some of my favorite moments.

Jamie and I were both 30 years old when we met. When you’re 30 you only think about the future. I’m speaking for the both of us here, but of course we can’t know for certain what chimpanzees think about. She certainly had nothing in her past worth remembering.

Now that we’re both a lot closer to 50, the walks feel different. There are fewer of them, and they feel more special. I can’t help but feel that for Jamie, too, they are imbued with nostalgia.

In hindsight, I can’t believe how much I used to hope that Jamie would let us go home on time. Now when she watches me close the door, I want to ask her:

Are you sure you don’t want to take another walk?