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I'd brought these morsels from Mom's after staying with her Sunday to Monday.

Food in hand, I walked within two feet of Gray Gull, but he retreated slightly, lost his footing, flew off and circled back, nearly touch my face with his wings as he landed on the deck.  Another predominantly white gull had landed on the railing, where Grey Gull was usually cock of the walk.  It was odd for him to allow another to take his place, usually shouldering out any other bird who'd try to get close to me and his supply of food.  But today he seemed different.

I knelt on the deck, near the railing, and extended my left hand to Grey Gull, who had his back to my expanse of living room windows looking out on the bay.  With with my right hand also full of tasty morsels of meat and potatoes, I reach up and rested it on the railing, tempting the white gull who'd never before dared to get close enough to eat from it.  Today was a first.  While Gray Gull gently took from my left hand, the white gull took from my right, more fiercely, sometimes biting my fingers, even as Gray Gull had, two months ago, when first he dared to eat from my hand.
 
Though I'd lived here on Budd Inlet for nearly 35 years, the gulls had never been pests nor even come close to the deck, circling instead over the bay.  But after the raccoons killed by pet peacocks, after nine years of Mama and Papa Peacock eating out of my hands, I continued to miss them.  When I had left-overs, I particularly missed feeding them to the peacocks.  So I decided to make "pets" of the gulls and perhaps the crows. I began by taking leftovers out onto the deck, spreading them on the railing and calling, "Here bird, this is for you.  Here gulls, this is for you.  Here crows, this is for you."  I was hoping they would soon recognize the sing-song  invitation and learn to come when I called them.  They did, but I don't know if it was the sound of my voice or just the sight of me, provider of goodies; for they'd come from half way across the bay.  And it got so they'd glimpse me through the windows of the living room when I'd first get up in the morning, and they'd come to the railing outside.

Such was the case this morning.  But what a strange blessing it was, to have two birds eating from my hands, simultaneously.  When they'd eaten most of the leftovers and Gray Gull was reluctant to keep venturing close enough to get the last morsels I offered, I packed up the rest, so I'd have some to offer them next day, and went inside the house.  Ten minutes later, I noticed the new white gull on the railing nearest the living room, and I thought I'd reward him for his bravery, of eating out of my hand, by giving him some croutons I'd placed by the door to feed them.  As I opened the sliding glass door, there was Gray Gull, just out side it, at my feet!  I was startled, had never fed him there, even when I was tempted to get under the deck cover out of the rain; but I didn't want the gulls leaving their" calling cards" anywhere but that one railing.
 
I stepped out onto the deck next to Gray Gull, and he scurried to the other side, near another railing, and nested down.  How sweet. So I thought I'd offer him some food, but as I knelt it startled him and he dropped off the side of the deck and onto the green grass and scurried over to the flag pole.  But how odd that he didn't just fly away; I'd never seen him on the lawn before.  I observed him for a moment, then decided to throw some morsels to him, where he was.  Then the phone rang and I went inside.

Next time I looked out, Gray Gull was nested in the grass on the edge of the pet graveyard, his head forward in the grass, much as Papa Peacock had looked, minutes before he died.  Had Gray Gull come home to die?  How strange that he would come to the graveyard, where he'd never been before.  I checked by the flag pole, and he appeared to have eaten the morsels I'd tossed there.  I went back inside to finish my call and return.

Next time I looked out, Gray Gull had apparently flopped down the grassy slope about 12 feet, his head still forward, his beak in the grass.  Though I was still on the phone, I walked down to take a closer look, fearing he was dead or dying.  His eye blinked and as I softly touched his feathers, he moved his head and curved his neck fully backwards, his beak pointing over his back, in a contortion I'd never seen before, reminiscent of a swan.  I wondered if something was stuck in his throat, if I should call a vet, describe the symptoms or bring him in to be examined.

I went back into the house and when I finished my business with the phone company, I took from the kitchen drawer a towel with which to wrap Gray Gull, and secure his wings, should I want to bring him inside and take him to the vet

When I reached him, his head was forward, beak downward in the grass, wings askew, eyes open, but this time he  didn't blink.  I touched him and slightly lifted him and found that his head stayed in that position, rigermortous had set in.  My poor, sweet Gray Gull was dead.  I stroked his smooth feathers, then left him and walked back up to the graveyard where he had settled earlier.  Where would I bury him?  There, next to the gladiolas I'd planted, or behind the cross that marked Mama and Papa Peacocks graves, or beneath the owl who guarded the grave of Muggins, my cat and companion for nearly 20 years?

I returned to the deck and looked for a shovel.  It must be back in the garage with the other tools.  I'd wait for Vos to come and help me bury my dead, even as he had Muggins.

When Vos phoned, I told him the sad news, as I have related it above.  He said, "It's hard to dig deep enough so that other animals won't dig it up, the way we did with the peacocks.  Maybe we should put him in a black plastic bag and, I know it sounds cruel, but put him in the garbage to be taken out, next trip."

I said, "No; I would rather take him down to the beach and put him on the water, to float away and set his soul free; though I know his soul is already free."

Vos said, "That's how it would be in nature, when they die."

So when Vos came to visit, I put on a down coat and the yellow rubber boots he had given me and led the way to Gray Gull.  I  knelt and gathered his half opened wings into my hands and pressed them close to his body.  Odd that his wings were still flexible, though his head, neck and body were stiffened by death.  It was comforting that he looked somewhat normal, and I wondered at his beauty.  To me he'd always seemed the most drab of the many different seagulls who gathered at a distance; yet Gray Gull was the most beautiful sight to me, for he trusted me and dared to eat from my hand.  Now, close up, I saw how exquisitely beautiful were the details of each gray feather. "Like a pheasant", Vos said.

I carried Gray Gull gently before me. Down the switchback trail to the beach, down the steps onto the dock, down the staircase to the beach itself, over the sand and shell and gravel to the waters edge, guessing from the dryness of the beach whether the tide was coming in or going out.
 
I knelt by the water and, holding Gray Gull above it, spoke to him of the happiness he had brought me and the freedom his soul would find, soaring once again.  I place him on the water, I gave him a gentlenudge outward and was blessed that he slowly floated down the bay rather than into the beach.
 
Vos said, "You gave him a lot of happiness in the last months of his life," "And he gave me a lot of happiness,"  I said through my throat choked with tears.  Vos and I walked with our arms around each other, back up the beach to the steps and the path.  I turned and picked out the image of Gray Gull floating on the bay, looking not unnatural that way.

I replayed the events of the day; how for the first time a second gull had eaten out of my hand, and how for the first time, Gray Gull had come to my door step, even as my pet duck had, after he'd been attacked and nearly died.  He survived that time, but eventually the coons got him. And the following year, the raccoons got my peacocks (along with making  national news, killing cats in the neighborhood).  Perhaps a coon had attacked Gray Gull and we just couldn't see the internal injury, Vos said.  Or perhaps Gray Gull had got some of the two cantaloupes thrown over the bank when the newspapers warned of E-coli causing illness among locals who'd eaten cantaloupe from Honduras.  Or perhaps he met the fate of many sea birds whose bodies lie poisoned along our waterways.

When Gray Gull had stretched his neck in such a contortion, I'd wondered if he had something stuck in his throat, for he was apt to gobble even the largest pieces of food whole.  But I'd not fed him anything large in weeks.  And besides, his behavior had been strange; having been gone for two days, then allowing another bird to dominate; then coming to my doorstep, a first; then to the graveyard, a first.  I would never know what took the life from my pet seagull.  He had so brightened my life.  And he would be missed for the rest of  mine.   

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Click on Photos to Enlarge

Harvey West (now from China), OHS class of 1958,
Gretchen Christopher (USA) '58,
Richard Vosburgh (USA), class of 1957
(Harvey purchased Gretchen's CD, SWEET SIXTEEN,
to take home to China!)
 

Harvey West, Mel Melin, class of 1958,
Richard Vosburgh, '57
Former Olympia High School Bears football teammates

(at Olympia's Sand in the City)
on Class of 58's 50th Reunion weekend

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