Artist: Laís Lima
My feet were cold and numb, barely feeling the ground while levitating forward.
A typical jog through my neighborhood, but at that particular time everything around me was intriguing. I’m usually not hanging out in Ocean Beach at noon, on a weekday. That chilly, overcast Monday would’ve been quieter if it wasn’t Martin Luther King Day, a holiday for some fortunate souls. Besides the regular OB crowd of beach bums, surfers, and prospective yogis, there were also tourists and San Diego residents enjoying their time off. I impatiently zig-zagged to avoid slow-moving pedestrians on the boardwalk. “Come on, y’all have seen tie dye shirts for sale before. Let’s get moving”, I mumbled to myself. My arrogance dissipated when I realized many were children and old people; in other words, either someone I was once lucky to be or someone I’ll be lucky to one day become. Letting empathy brew in my heart, I blessed their tortoise pace.
When I reached the pier, I smiled at my favorite sign, “Throw Kelp Back Into Ocean” and at the fly fishers of all different backgrounds, lining up in front of the sketchy little café overhanging the ocean. I noticed the seagulls on the rails and how much dirtier they were compared to their La Jolla counterparts. The other day I saw the fluffiest, most impeccably white seagull in La Jolla Cove, as majestic as if it had forgotten it was a seagull. The ones from Ocean Beach resembled retired pirates, some missing an eye or a leg, perfectly qualified for an eye patch and a tiny parrot on their shoulder.
Photo credit: Ameer Basheer
I kept running to the end of the pier and stopped to stretch my tight lower back. Some minutes later, my thoughts of how embarrassing my lack of flexibility is for an active young lady were interrupted by a pair of piercing baby-blue eyes. There you were, standing on the right corner of the rail, lowkey checking me out. You opened your wings, lazily letting the offshore wind dry your feathers. You look so pre-historic. The yellow fuzzy head followed by a long red beak and framed by a wide wingspan; makes you look like a modern pterodactyl. It’s funny how humans have such a clear image of dinosaurs; we don’t seem to mind the 65-million-year gap between their death and our birth. We take mere impressions of their skeletons on old rocks and then let Steven Spielberg’s imagination do the rest of the job. The result is a vivid impression that we’ve seen, heard, and even run away from a dinosaur before.
As I stared at your reincarnated body, another big bird was emerging from behind the hills, taking off from a nearby airport. That reminded me why my back was so stiff; long hours sitting inside its gigantic metal carcass. I had just flown back from Brazil, where pelicans are not really a thing. I don’t know why your peeps don’t like it there, it seems to be perfectly habitable for you: beautiful estuaries, plenty of fish in the sea and one of the most diverse avian communities in the world. A hotspot for descendants of theropod dinosaurs like yourself. It’s true that many coastal sites are overfished and polluted, but let’s not pretend you don’t already deal with that. I bet the flavor of your well-earned catch of the day would be accentuated by the sound of a good samba that swings so cool and sways...
Anyway, you should go for a flight down there when you’re feeling adventurous.
We have company. The tourists, their smartphones, and their ability to miss the present moment for some clicks. They came to take photos of you. You looked at them with distrust, I gave them a disdainful glare: “Look at those poor souls, choosing the digital life over the real one.” I, on the other hand, was doing it right; sitting on the bench, having an imaginary conversation with my homie seabird, practicing mindfulness. Then I thought about the half dozen times per second I’d felt inclined to take a selfie with you and decided I was no better than any human excited to photograph a pelican.
After they left, it was just the two of us again for a while, until you dive-bombed into the ocean. I promptly stood up to search for you, looking down only to find a frustrated bird that just missed a shot at lunch. I felt bad. You’d spent all that time drying your wings, now you’re all wet, and hungry. As a homeotherm myself, I get you; it takes a lot of energy to maintain our body temperature stable and high. I know, I know I’m a privileged version. Here I go, heading home where food is not going to swim away from me, feeling warm thanks to my puffy jacket by Patagonia.
By the way, speaking of South American nature: you should seriously consider that trip to Brazil. Life is short; get out of your comfort zone. Remember what happened to your family in Louisiana in the 1960’s, the situation with DDT that almost killed the future of pelicans? Yeah… The world is wild and changing quick. We may become The Dinosaurs of the Future pretty soon. In the meantime, hope to catch you chillin’ by the pier someday and enjoy more time together. Carpe diem, brother.
And to be honest, I still regret not taking that selfie.
- Laís
Photo credit: Tony Butler