One of the things that I love about living here in Canso, Nova Scotia is waking up to the sounds of the gulls crying overhead. The early morning hours are also sometimes marked by the rhythm of the foghorn and the horn of the lobster boats reversing out from their moorings at dawn.
The breaking of dawn along the waterfront is often quite magical as the softest pinkish tones mark the first rays of sunlight to hit the North American continent on this easterly peninsula.
Last summer my son Josh came down for a visit. Over a period of several week, he fed the gulls from our Bed & Breakfast leftovers, toast and bread. The gulls were a rather hungry mob once the lobster season finished and there were few other fishing boats coming into the harbour. They were suprisingly adept at learning how to jump for food; at least that is how it looked from where I was standing. As Josh threw the bread into the air, the gulls caught it on the wing a few feet off the ground. Those that “jumped” had the advantage over those that couldn’t as they caught the food mid-air before it hit the ground when a melee erupted.
The antics of the gulls and their various characters gradually emerged over the weeks that Josh talked to them as he fed them. So this is the story of Josh.
Posted by emeasures 