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pigeons on the pier
Saturday, March 20 1999
Kim and I are so used to having horrible fights that we recover from them almost instantly. As obnoxious as I was last night, all was forgiven this morning. A terrible hangover intensified my feelings of regret. Additonally, we were both feeling guilty about abandoning Jenna and Kevin last night, fearing that we might be just a little to flakey for such serious and responsible friends as they.
We went down to Newport, to Ortega's, the cute little Mexican restaurant with the waitress who speaks no English. For Kim, mornings following terrible fights with me seem to require big greasy breakfasts as a kind of cosmic consolation.
We walked to the beach. The tide was high and the waves were enormous, driven by an offshore storm. The waves were so high they were actually licking the underside of the fisherman's pier, a large concrete structure which extends a half mile from the beach out into the ocean. A few intrepid surfers were riding these waves, from my angle seeming perilously close to death against the tall iron piles supporting the pier. I think the most wonderful thing about waves is how relentless they are. They have no concern for the things they pound to pieces; they are raw mammoth energy and they have to happen if only to conserve energy in the universe.
It turns out that Kevin and Jenna had a wonderful time together last night, so much so that our abandoning them wasn't much of an issue. This news was definitely the highlight of he day.
In the afternoon, Kevin was supposed to hang out with Jenna, but an emergency database crisis at our place of employment came up and he had to play with computers instead. When he finally made it here to Ocean Beach, Jenna was gone, leaving indications that she was in the process of playing petty little "I'm too good to be treated this way" games. So Kevin ended up hanging out with us. Later we were joined by Al. Kim went off to work and we boys went down to the beach to watch the waves.
On the beach this one guy (who just happened to be black, not that that matters, but we all like to be able to picture the characters about which we read) was flying a stunt kite with incredible skill. He could expertly place it anywhere upon a half-dome-shaped surface in the sky (defined by the length of the strings), or fly it evenly above the ground. When the kite finally crashed irredeemably, Kevin, Al and I all applauded. The guy should have had a hat out; we would have left donations.
We decided to walk out on the fishing pier to better experience the restive ocean. The pier starts from where the sands of Ocean Beach give way to the rocky shores further to the south along the Sunset Cliffs of Point Loma. Once you're out on the pier, its easy to get a sense that you've gone to a alien, oceanic world. The waves smash against the barnacle-encrusted piles while both concealing and alluding to other dangers, both real and imaginary. It's beautiful, but in a scary way. Today only the expert surfers were out, but all along the pier, an audience had gathered to watch them showcase their skills. Finally there was a little justification for quitting that job at the record store or pizza place.
Today the view from the pier was nothing short of mind-blowing. The air was crystal clear and as long as an object was large enough and within my line of sight, I could see it no matter how far away it was. The deep perspective featured the houses of Mission Beach in the mid-background, receding quickly to those of Pacific Beach and on to the hilly interruption of La Jolla. Beyond that, the mountains continued indicating the shoreline until their tops were lost beneath the curve of the Earth. To the south were a few Mexican Islands. I wondered what unspeakable acts took place upon them.
About two thirds of the way out on the pier is a café. Here, along with various tourists, dazed elderly people and an assortment of locals, a great many opportunistic birds gather to snack on the many things that don't get eaten. These include a great many pigeons and seagulls. Kevin and Al are not ones to see much beauty in things not traditionally regarded as dignified and beautiful, and they regarded these birds with absolute disdain. "Pigeons are nothing more than rats with wings," Al said with disgust. I asked them which bird had more dignity, the pigeon or the seagull. Al wasn't sure, but Kevin was convinced that seagulls were probably the superior bird. When Kevin saw a pair of pigeons engaging in courtship on the ocean-side of the hand rail, he decided to go out of his way to give them a scare. Like an eight year old boy, he snuck up to the rail just behind them and gave it a mighty kick with his hiking boots. It was obvious that, unlike me, he's never had any empathy for this admittedly opportunistic (though beautiful) urban bird. The pigeons weren't too freaked out by Kevin's immature antic; they relocated a dozen feet away to a concrete ledge and resumed their courtship. The male was making deep cooing noises and the female was standing still and being submissive. Periodically they'd preen each other or go beak-to-beak in an extended passionate kiss (Kevin was appalled, imagining them to be exchanging vomit, which may have been the case). After a minute of this courtship, the male hopped up on the female. Their sexual intercourse lasted less than a second, after which they stood beside each other, casually and obliviously preening themselves, like two post-coital lovers smoking cigarettes. I got the feeling that neither Kevin nor Al got any sense of poetry from these pigeons' love. These co-workers are both fairly limited in terms of what they're willing to address with their intellectual curiosities. All Kevin would say was that he was impressed how quickly a male pigeon can "get his nut." And all Al would say was how terrible it was that now these pigeons would raise a family of yet more pigeons.
At the café, Al ordered a plate of fries. They looked so good, so golden-brown, I had to order yet another from the stoner hippie chick running the place. Kevin, on the other hand, had just started his zero-carbohydrate diet and he couldn't watch. The french fry is, after all, the highest expression of the carbohydrate, and every cell of his body was crying out, "feed me starch." Gradually Kevin was coming to the realization that his food options had suddenly become extremely limited. "I can't even drink a Coke! What can I drink?" he asked in desperation. "Beef boullion?" I suggested helpfully.
About that time, Kevin was saved by his pager. It was the German girl, and now she was even more pissed off. Kevin, you see, had left a note telling her to meet us on the beach, but when she'd gone there she'd missed us because we'd gone out on the pier. Sensing he had to take some sort of action if he wanted to remain in the running for getting some of that German pussy, Kevin decided to go find her, abandoning Al and me and our carbohydrates on the pier. Al thought it was sad to see a guy being pussy whipped by a girl whose name he's not even sure how to pronounce.
By this point, I was sick of eating my fries, and as we headed back home, a sunburned bum asked for some and I gave him the whole basket. I was planning to donate them to the seagulls, but aiding my fellow man was perhaps a higher calling. "Human seagull," I remarked to Al, and he nodded in agreement.
I have some sort of strange abscess in my mouth in the spot where my lower right jaw meets my tongue, throat and inner-ear. It's such a cross-roads of body parts that I can't really tell if it's a gum problem, a tongue problem, an ear problem, a canker sore, or a sore throat. I suspect that it might be secreting foul-smelling substances, which could mean it's a fucked-up salivary duct. That would account for Kim asking me this morning how long it's been since I brushed my teeth. This evening I took drastic action, hitting the spot with my usual arsenal of do-it-yourself medicine: saline solution, massage, and Vitamin C.
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