Chapter 9, Homing: Returning to Oneself Summary and Analysis

Here the author uses yet another story to introduce a complex process that can be part of the female experience. The main story is about a painfully lonely man who finds a woman. However, she is not an ordinary woman at all; in fact, she is a seal-woman. This means that her normal form is that of a seal, but unlike ordinary seals, she can emerge from the water and actually transform into the shape of a human woman. This makes her like some of the merfolk because she can function on land as a human. The man's plight is simple: without other companionship, he is even more keen to find a mate. What he would have done were he not lonely remains unknown, but the truth is that he was acutely so...