Scent of a dead seal

Sunday. Not many words in the dictionary as pleasing as that one. No obligations to harsh your mellow. Sweat pants are seen as appropriate attire. Dinner is served early and typically ends with a slice of pie. The next time I go to church, I’m thanking God for saving His best day for last.

It was a recent bird-chirping Sunday morning that Ashley and I decided to skip the typical layabout options and go for a hike. Didn’t even touch the couch. Just got up and went.

The Taurus steered us to nearby Pacifica, a foggy surf town that spills into the ocean from battered bluffs. We grabbed a hot coffee at the pier and watched fishermen reel up Dungeness crabs. One seemingly friendly man condemned a “son of a bitch” starfish to the cement for stealing his bait. Unkind.

As we marched up the beach towards the trailhead, a rancid smell brought us to a gagging stop. It was a massive beached seal. And it stanked big time. We hooked around the deceased so the wind was at our backs and began a forensic examination.

Crows. Maggots. Flies. The usual scavengers were already on the scene tampering with the evidence. We first checked for a shark bite, which would have been totally rocking. Negative. Six-pack rings? Negative. Harpoon? Also negative. We declared the official cause of death to be “Circle of Life” and moved on with our hike.

After climbing around for a bit and disturbing a garter snake with a stick, we decided to visit the jewel in Pacifica’s crown—Sea Bowl. Featuring a glass rotunda bar and unnecessarily generous orders of cheese fries, this bowling alley is a thing of beauty. We rented a lane for an hour and squeezed in three games, enough to make this athlete work up a healthy sweat. (A quick but important aside, I dropped a career high 168—high fives all around!) Feeling very satisfied with our day, we hit the road.

On the drive home we stopped by Safeway to pick up dinner provisions. It was at the meat cooler that a putrid odor slapped us across the face. Did I say slapped? I meant punched. Eyes blurred. Knees buckled. Gasping for air. I put the chicken breasts to my nose. Negative. Ashley checked the pork chops. Negative. I put my shirt over my nose and nearly exploded. It was the dead seal. No doubt about it.

We drove home with our heads out the window completely baffled. What awoke these dormant molecules? Was it the bowling-induced sweat? The cheese fries? While these questions will remain forever unanswered, I learned something about life that day: Your surroundings rub off on you. If you work in a delicious cookie factory, you will smell like delicious cookies. If you stand over a decomposing sea mammal for 10 minutes, you will smell like a decomposing sea mammal. So just be mindful of where you spend your time.