The Flock at Dusk

I have no photograph to accompany this story. And that is right. And I am not certain that I should even write the story but then I might lose the memory, flown away like every day and every sunset.

The sun had disappeared and still I sat on my board, floating happily out near the mouth of the estuary. There were few clouds, all strewn and stretched across the horizon, from the point to the north to the sinking sun in the west. Above was clear but punctuated by Venus winking in the west. There were barely perceptible rays stretching out from the departed sun, still bright and powerful below the water.

Big, curling, barreling waves were breaking and the line-up was thinning with the darkness. Neither Bailey nor I had yet ripped one of these gorgeous waves—the more skilled surfers took long fast shots off to the right but we were not so competent. We waited and shifted our gaze in each moment from the wave sets to the darkening shore and to the far-off mess of clouds silhouetted in orange. Charlie waded in-shore from us, checking out the waves and body-surfing as able.

And then we felt them coming and we saw the thick flock of birds zooming towards us from the shore. There were dozen of them, or there were hundreds, or or... I will never be certain. The small birds—terns? I have no idea—flipped and turned over each other as they flew past us and out to open water. None dove for the water. Were they looking for fish or just celebrating their freedom in the gorgeous light?

And then I remembered where I was and I turned towards the still radiant horizon and saw all the birds cut black out of the orange to blue sky. And they were swooping and magic and I was awed and, in that tiny moment, I was not thinking of anyone or anything else anywhere. I just was, and it was good.