Friday 4 March 2016

Under Exmouth Skies (Part 31)

UNDER EXMOUTH SKIES (Part 31)

I fear seagulls in Exmouth are getting bigger and one day will be the size of pterodactyls. No longer will they be feeding on detritus and the rubbish from dustbins but will have their eye on more nourishing prey. At the very least, the signs in town will have to be changed from 'Please don't feed the seagulls' to 'Please don't feed the seagulls - your children'.

For all that, the question remains: Where do seagulls go when they die? Why aren't our streets strewn with their carcasses? Is it true they head out to sea to die? If so, does this mean they know when they are soon to die and like elephants head for a fabled graveyard? What is this sense of death they might have and why don't we as people have the same? Or maybe we do? If only on a subconscious level? On a humankind level, are we actually somehow aware of our impending demise and might this explain Donald Trump? Might this explain David Cameron?

If indeed seagulls do head out to sea to die then what distance are we talking about? Why is there never seagull remains swept up onto the shore? You'll find everything else under the sun (and from under other suns too) swept up on the shore at break of day but never a hint of seagull.

The world is a strange, mysterious, frightening but wonderful place and no more so than in Exmouth where seagulls the size of dinosaurs hover outside your bedroom window on a morning and Armageddon is not denied.

Exmouth is a favoured seaside holiday resort that welcomes careful drivers and happy campers.

2 comments:

  1. Ah, where do birds go to die?! I love the fact that it seems they just take themselves off somewhere quiet and private to fade away whereupon they can be absorbed back into the earth or the sea... fed on by beetles or fish or whatever... and it all kinda happens in secret.
    Yesterday I witnessed an altogether different kind of avian demise when a sparrowhawk caught a starling in my garden. It was a noisy and brutal killing but oddly wondrous at the same time. All that is left now is a large pile of carefully plucked feathers.

    But that clip from the Birds looks like heaven to me!

    ReplyDelete