Read Online Chicken Soup for the Ocean Lover's Soul by Jack Canfield - Free Book Online

wisecracks. Frank seemed to enjoy the attention, though. I suppose the daily verbal jousts kept Frank’s mind off his problems. His wife passed away during the winter, and years of hard work had taken their toll on his body. Unable to haul heavy gear across the sand, Frank was relegated to fishing near the parking area.
    We were friends in the quiet, casual way of fishermen, but we really didn’t get to know each other until the spring of 1999. That was when we first noticed the little seagull with one leg. White and gray with a long slender beak and dark eyes, it swam surprisingly well, although a bit slower than the other birds. The real comedy—and what really caught our attention—began when it got on dry land. Hopping around in search of a meal, it looked like a drunk staggering home. Or, as John put it, “like Frank on a good day.” We felt a little sorry for it, so we fed it some of our bait. Jimmy figured it had lost its leg to a bluefish. He was probably right. A hungry bluefish would eat anything that moves, and with its powerful jaws, there was no question it could bite a bird’s leg clean off.
    That was how it began. Our new mascot would go off from time to time. But he always came back, sometimes a day later, sometimes two. John would always toss some fresh fish at him and comment on how well he was doing. We figured he was a pretty tough customer, surviving on one leg. He took what life dealt him and found a way to keep going. Then one day, he showed up with a broken wing—a death sentence for a seagull. He probably had hurt himself trying to land—those one-foot landings had to be tricky. It was clear that our friend needed all the help we could give him.
    Every day, the seagull waited for us to come and fish, knowing that a meal pretty much always came with the deal. When Frank offered food, it would hop toward us, its injured wing dragging behind it. John called the seagull and Frank “birds of a feather.” And when we realized that the other birds were stealing the injured gull’s food, we took it upon ourselves to shoo away the hungry, healthier intruders. Deep down we knew it had no chance of surviving the winter—no matter what we did. But we chose to ignore the truth. We were determined to make the best of it. We cared for the bird as though it was a member of the family.
    During this time, Frank began to open up about his wife. He seemed to accept things more. It was as though this silly bird gave him something to care about again. At some point, the bird even took Frank’s place as the butt of John’s jokes. Even when the fishing was better in other places, we chose not to leave. Our friend would be waiting there, happy to see us, and we didn’t want to disappoint him.
    The days grew shorter. The fish had already begun their fall migration. We knew the bird’s days were numbered. When the fish moved south, they took our little mascot’s food supply with them. In a desperate attempt to circumvent Mother Nature, John and Frank made daily trips to the beach with bread and little pieces of fish.
    One day the pair came with their food, but the bird didn’t show. They waited for hours. “Maybe we’ll see him tomorrow,” John said hopefully. But Frank knew the truth. The inevitable had come to pass. But Frank wasn’t as sad as he thought he would be. The little bird had brought this solitary group of fishermen together in an unexpected way. These men, as different from one another as they could be, had cared for it, each in their own way, expecting nothing in return. The fact was, the little bird had become their friend. “No,” Frank said, “I don’t think we will be seeing him pass this way again.” He looked out across the water. “We gave him one heck of a summer, though.”
    Stephen Byrne

A Day on the New Hampshire Shore
    W e do not associate the idea of antiquity with the ocean, nor wonder how it looked a thousand years ago, as we do of the land, for it was equally wild and