jonathan seagull

for a long time now, every time i walk into a bookstore, i instantly start thinking about a book i read, or actually we were read to, i want to say when i was in 8th grade. don't ask me why in 8th grade we were being read to - its just that my middle school and high school experience is quite different from the others, mainly because i was in a "different" school. (actually you can ask me later, but i dont feel like getting into it now.) anyway, once every week all the students from the same grade gathered in a room, and i guess one time reading this book was on the schedule (and the guy who read it was very good at it too). but i never really gave it any thought beyond that, and ended up forgetting about my favorite read of almost 10 years ago, until yesterday.

somehow i was reminded of the book again, and this time i felt inspired to find it and read it again. i only remembered a few words from the book, and all in farsi anyway, so it took me a while to find it, since i didnt remember the name either. but after some research, i was happy to find it available at the barnes and noble closest to my work, and so on my way to class i picked it up.

it is a very short read - it only took me about an hour, and im a slow reader. but i just finished it and now i remember why it was burned into my young 14 year old brain.

here is the first passage from "Jonathan Livingston Seagull," by Richard Bach:

          It was morning, and the new sun sparkled gold across the ripples of a gentle sea. A mile from shore a fishing boat chummed the water, and the word for Breakfast Flock flashed through the air, till a crowd of a thousand seagulls came to dodge and fight for bits of food. It was another busy day beginning.

          But way off alone, out by himself beyond boat and shore, Jonathan Livingston Seagull was practicing. A hundred feet in the sky he lowered his webbed feet, lifted his beak, and strained to hold a painful hard twisting curve through his wings. The curve meant that he would fly slowly, and now he slowed until the wind was a whisper in his face, until the ocean stood still beneath him. He narrowed his eyes in fierce concentration, held his breath, forced one... single... more... inch... of... curve.... Then his feathers ruffled, he stalled and fell.

          Seagulls, as you know, never falter, never stall. To stall in the air is for them disgrace and it is dishonor.

          But Jonathan Livingston Seagull, unashamed, stretching his wings again in that trembling hard curve - slowing, slowing, and stalling once more - was no ordinary bird.