We returned from the mainland today in a tranquil sunset, loaded up with groceries, propane, gasoline and sharpened chain saw blades. The herring gulls put on quite a show as we crossed, circling the boat, hoping we were lobstermen about to throw old bait overboard, swooping and diving and then coming to settle innocently on the surface of the waves, puffing out their feathers.
The gulls are here all year, so we take their presence for granted. They do not elicit the thrill of a first sighting in spring or the vague melancholy that comes in October when we realize that a migratory bird has flown away. A kind of silence settles gradually over the island. But the gulls remain.
And so in winter we see them differently. Sometimes we stop what we're doing to watch them float above the spruce trees near the shore. And this evening they drifted over the harbour against a high pale blue Nova Scotia sky, lit by a golden sunset so that they themselves seemed touched by gold, as luminous as Renaissance angels.
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