Tire Rotation

You, who looked and never saw...
escape without looking back--your presence
is not needed here.

You, who saw but never looked...
crushing is your weight so that I cannot
bear to witness your existence.

You, who searched and found...
answered my unspoken plea--
run for both our sakes.

So today I realized which bird I can most identify with, given the traits I seem to find the authority to project onto it.

The seagull.

However annoying, pushy, crowding, shameless, and completely deplorable most people find them, I've decided they're gritty creatures with a fantastic set of abilities.

Deciding I needed air, I spent a few hours just walking around, planning on visiting the swans again for some visual inspiration for juries tomorrow (since I am performing a piece about one of the freakin' things) and found myself on a bench beneath a cedar tree watching seagulls paddle luxuriously next to the ducks and Hitler's birds (Joannie-speak for swans) themselves. I thought, whew, they're far from home, but then I realized--who am I to say where they should be? Maybe I'm the one out of place. Maybe all the birds residing on the beaches stealing food from tourists are the ones in the wrong. Or maybe we're all right. I began to admire the gull's adaptive capabilities, and even found their steady glide across the surface as graceful as one of those deplorable creatures sitting a few feet away getting gawked at by the touring seniors. I thought--you don't have to be a swan to be a swan!

Smiling, I then realized all the negative traits humanity has assigned to the gull are negative only because they tread unfavorably on human toes, pooping on our cars and clogging the beaches with thousands of noisy, squalling birds that elicit entertainment from dive bombing picnickers. Really, if you step out of this human perspective, these guys are amazing for being able to coexist with hundreds upon hundreds of fellows in their flock--and can I blame them for taking advantage of opportunities? I'd say a dumb non-beach-native who throws the first crumb deserves the ripples and bird poo. The noise they make--so harsh, but true, raw, honest--is much less unsettling than taking life in silence. It is what it is. (Said swan sneezed, and I was taken aback by how similar the sound was to a car hiccuping a golf ball out the muffler).

How curious, too, they seem to be. They're constantly tilting their head, never accepting one view of anything. Did you know that they're born able to feed themselves, and leave the nest after a month? Some kinds of swans don't leave until a whole year has gone by...

At first I was appalled--what the hell, I don't want to be seagull! I'm not like that, I don't dig through trash! Surely I'd at least be a sparrow or something cool like a raven! How anti-climactic! But alas, the voices in my head adjourned the conference, the verdict being I should suck it up and accept my 'negative' traits and admire my adaptive devices, even if it means not everyone can see the beauty in my occasional grating squawk and pushy perseverance (like people complain about me being overbearing--feels like it, someitmes). Not everyone can something socially acceptable like an eagle or something. Besides, at least my species isn't going extinct. ;p

With the dorm clean and all, it's weird how much spare time I seem to have sprouted from nothingness. Without all that distraction and clutter, life is not nearly as busy as I thought...

Two days in a row I dropped in on the practice rooms, even just for thirty minutes. Out of a whim, really, an experiment to see if my mind can overcome my bodily urge to leave it until the last minute. I'm doing that lately, seeing how hard I can push myself to get things done.

Tonight, I sat and ate dinner with a table full of people I've never met before, all different majors and types of people. And you know what? I flourished. Well, I thought so, anyhow. Kept a good flow of intelligent words coming out of my mouth at appropriate times.

Geez, I'm slipping back into old habits--but I don't care. I think I'll enjoy this summer spent on fanfiction and re-beating Baten Kaitos.

Oh, and practicing. >.>