#NewThisDay Writing From My Photo Stream
The Royal Terns
“A sleek seabird of warm saltwater coasts, the Royal Tern lives up to its regal name with a tangerine-colored bill and ragged, ink-black crest against crisp white plumage. Royal Terns fly gracefully and slowly along coastlines, diving for small fish, which they capture with a swift strike of their daggerlike bills. They are social birds, gathering between fishing expeditions on undisturbed beaches and nesting in dense, boisterous colonies. In late summer and fall, Royal Terns lose most of their black crest and sport a white forehead.”
Heron
Ah, the wind died down, my hat stayed firmly atop my head and the shorebirds came back to the water’s edge and I walked so happily in their company this morning: the royal terns and the heron and the snowy egret and the sandpipers and gulls, pelicans and all fishing for their breakfasts. I walked into the Sunday sanctuary. At Longboat Pass bridge a group of teen boys fished. They caught a stingray, a big wild beauty, by mistake. I watched nearby. They took his picture. I worried. I wanted the wild thing left alone. He waved the flaps of his rays, he struggled, and I wanted him to not be caught and held out of his element. I spoke to the boys. “You’ll let him go?” One of them took clippers, cut him free from the hook. “Yes, Ma’am,” they said. I watched them let the stingray go and then I breathed easy again, kept walking by the surf, by the birds. Today was a lovely warm day of company, friends leaving, friends arriving. Far from home, we are still connected to old friends. How lucky we are. I am preparing, in my mind, for travel. I will go to San Antonio on Tuesday to AWP–huge literary conference. A friend who runs a literary magazine who had planned to host a book signing for me canceled her trip today because of the corona virus, and I understand, she feels at risk. It’s a strange moment of uncertainty for all us. It’s 10,000 people. I will wash my hands and forego handshakes and I’ll be glad to be there. Friends who are here this evening say: first case of the virus today in Armenia, a country that cannot handle this at all well. Oh! And we kayaked today with our friends from across the street up the canal and into the bay, I wanted to show them bird island where countless birds gather in the trees surrounded by water. And I wanted to get lucky and show them the roseate spoonbill I have seen there. And, yes! There she/he was! Pink feathered and spoonbilled sitting majestically on a branch letting us take a long, close sighing look of appreciation. What a treasure! How lucky a day this was.
