Oregon Seagulls

When my youngest was pre-teen, we took an RV trip, just him and me, down the Oregon coast. We had some left-over bread that we thought would be a nice treat for the few seagulls we saw soaring so gracefully along the ocean breezes. We pulled over at a coastline rest area and after gathering and breaking up the pieces, we exited our rig and parked ourselves on the rest area bench that faced the ocean. After breathing in the sights and sounds of the ocean waves for a few minutes, we tossed out our first handfuls. A few of the birds took notice, made some bird noises, and the next thing we knew the sky went white with movement. Those birds came in from EVERYWHERE! They landed a mere few feet from us and began battling for blood amongst themselves for the pittance we had brought with us. As they got closer and closer to us, we could see the damage they were inflicting on each other as their bloodied bodies vied for a front row seat at the buffet we had created. We quickly got up, tossed the rest of the bread and RAN for cover, the whole time being chased by the stragglers to the party. It felt a lot like a scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Birds” as we both vowed to NEVER do that again!