184: whale

So you can be sure some jerk is down at the beach scavenging whale vertebrae as we speak. They're poking at the ribs, pecked by seabirds, and they're already planning on how they're going to pour boiling water in a bathtub or the large vat in their backyard and boil the bones clean and then they're going to turn them into tribal jewelry or furniture and they're not going to leave anything for anyone else and they're going to take pictures on their cellphones and pass things on to their grandchildren and smell like dead whale for days, even weeks. This is so annoying because it's exactly what I was planning to do and now I'm being thwarted. I should have pitched claim stakes or just settled in the surf with a rifle and a knife.

I found a whale carcass today. Well, not exactly found. I mean, yes, I found it but I was on a hunt for it. I'd been told there was a rumor of a whale washed up on the beach, so I at least knew my hunting might lead somewhere. It wasn't a stumbling by chance. F.C. was doing something productive and Bishop is still out of town so I went by myself. I looked to the north and saw only tourists and Washington, distant (like it should be). I looked to the south and saw only emptiness, the waves bucking like horses and surging with foam, and then, looking longer, I saw a heap bigger than drift wood that seemed to glisten and as I watched, I saw seagulls rise up as the tide washed around the heap.

It was the whale, or what was left of it.

I think it was flipped on its back and the ribbed vertically stomach was what glistened in the full sun. One long flipper, a snake trickle of spine near where it's head used to be or maybe still was, crushed underneath somewhere. Another huge chunk of it rested several yards away from the bulk of the carcass, already stripped of (I'm guessing) what made it edible. I know almost nothing about whale anatomy. It's kind of embarrassing. Seagulls swarmed the whale carcass, cursing each other in a variety of clicks and screams and gutter utterances. They arched their necks in ugly ways and fixed their eyes on intruders and bellowed damnations. Little white piper-type birds scuttled in the tide. They kept a 10 foot distance from me at all times, scurrying in huge arcs when they wanted to pass me and go to the other side. I'd hate to be that worried.

The carcass was more like a whale cutlet than a whale. So much for that spiritual moment with nature, I guess.

I hung around for quite a while to watch how the birds handled it all. It's weird how the meat looked like frayed bits of rope, not like anything solid or relevant. Just dead. Very dead.

Then people started wheeling by in their pick up trucks and SUVs and came out clutching cameras and cellphones and it all got boring. So I left.

Gray whales should be finishing up their pass of the Oregon Coast. They migrate down to Mexico from the Arctic Ocean in the winter and come back this way in the spring, en route to the Bering and Chukchi Seas where they feed during the summer. I don't know if this was a Gray Whale or not. It was gray, but so are other things. My jeans, for instance. I would hate to just start making statements.

In the 1600-1700s men with greasy hair, sailing in wooden boats, hunted Gray Whales to extinction in the Atlantic. Shocker. Fortunately, in the Pacific, they were only hunted to the brink of extinction and so, I don't know, scientists and people who like Gray Whales invented helium balloons and transported whales by air across the continent and thus repopulated the Atlantic. They also tried this with mustangs, except, for reasons unknown, the mustangs' balloons deflated while still passing over the United States. And so now we have wild mustang herds everywhere and the nasty creatures have formed gangs and their universal motto is "Death to the Bureau of Land Management!" and they kill women and red-haired children and trample everything that comes in their path, showing no mercy and expecting none in return. There's been a Disney movie made about them called "Spirit" and the horses are blowing up trains and bringing down industry and just generally destroying everything and laughing the whole time. Also they have eyebrows.

"The burros, yeah they'll kick your teeth out," said an agent for the BLM, who spoke under condition of anonymity. "But those mustangs, they'll kick your teeth out then make you eat them, one by one, and as you're scrambling in the dust, stuffing your own teeth in your mouth and chewing, the (expletive deleted) will start cantering around you until you can't see the sky for all the dust flying. All you hear is this eerie whinnying. Like a ghost train. Like the sound of death."

"... If you ask me, the 1971 Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act was the worst idea we've ever had. The things run like the wind itself, so it's not like anyone ever really got a decent shot off anyway. I carry a garroting wire at all times. As far as I know, rifles are out and missiles and poison, but I didn't ever see 'no garroting wire allowed' in the BLM manual, post 1976. So there."

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Yeah...so...anyway. It's Day 2 of this year, which means Day 2-type ceremonies but mostly dish-washing. I'm out of spoons.