Shearwaters: September’s Promise

by
Maria V. Eyles

               A mirage-swept sea brings soul gifts as I contemplate it, Raphael at my feet, from our bench on the boardwalk. The shearwaters have returned! 

Shearwaters are migratory seabirds that start their 10,000 mile pilgrimages in Tasmania or New Zealand. Never still, they fly low above the surface of the water.  From New Zealand, their flight arcs over to the tip of Chile. Then they head north along the South American littoral, up toward California. Their northernmost stop I do not know. Yet, I believe, it may be Monterey, California, where they visit for a bit, then turn back to make the return trip to Tasmania or New Zealand, their breeding grounds.

Today is August 29, 2011, so according to my emotional memory, they are a few days early. Few people on the Pismo Beach boardwalk even notice the shearwaters; if they do, they may mistake them for an oil spill. With Labor Day late this year, Pismo Beach is sparsely populated this Monday, as if Hoover Vacuum Buses sucked back the waves of tourists, only to spew out a tsunami-load of them next weekend.

So from my bench’s vista, great swerves of sand frame the Pacific, the few surfers, joggers, dog-walkers and beach-goers like colorful actors on a tiny movie set. Most ignore the avian phenomenon at sea.

My late husband Geoffrey would never have ignored them. Early every September, he would comb the boardwalk and the pier, lean over the Sea Venture balcony, or sit with book and binoculars on a bench, and scan for shearwaters. Some years they didn’t come to Pismo. But on the right day, suddenly Geoffrey would be standing, and sweeping his arm at the elbow he’d exclaim in delight, “Shearwaters!”

Today’s sighting heightens those memories: A trembling sunlight infiltrates the fog about a half mile up from the surf. The sea swells gently in seafoam green skeined with blue-gray. (Blue-gray was the color of Geoffrey’s eyes, the irises rimmed in gold.) Sprinkled atop the ocean, as if some clumsy angel overturned a peppermill, are thousands of black specks forming rolling ribbons of shearwaters. They look to be floating on the water, but they’re in fact hovering above in perpetual motion, feeding on sardines and anchovies.

Shearwaters come, they give us inexpressible delight, and they vanish as mysteriously as they appear. In a day, maybe two, they will head north to Monterey, then not long after, around and back toward Chile. Sometimes they venture close to shore; other times they are too far out to observe.

Joy crests within me like a standing wave.  Memory flashes of Geoffrey and me hugging each other around the waist, mesmerized by the shearwaters. These birds appear like animate spirit, an ephemeral depiction of divine purpose in nature’s theater. After all, the shearwaters did fly thousands of miles to share the wonders of life with us.

Thus, the shearwaters’ surprise arrival in September, Geoffrey’s birthday month, so moved my husband that before he died, he made a promise: Whenever I saw the shearwaters, I should understand that Geoffrey’s spirit was surrounding me in special closeness.  Their fleeting beauty, he said, reflected perfectly our signature song, September Song by Kurt Weil:

               “…and the days dwindle down to a precious few…
                              September! November!
                              And these few precious days
                              I’ll spend with you,
                              These precious days…I’ll spend with you.”

               So here I mark it: August 29, 2011. One precious day indeed.

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Note: the photo, if I can upload it, does not show California shearwaters (rather they are shearwaters from the Azores, it says)…but you get the idea.