Ten people showed up at church this morning. One of them was a reporter from the New Bedford Standard-Times, reporting on Mayor Scott Lang’s call to religious organizations for a day of reflection and prayer this weekend, following the hate crime at Puzzles Lounge last week, and its aftermath; the reporter visited us because apparently First Unitarian was just about the only downtown church that held worship services this morning. The wind-blown snow made driving very difficult. I’d say we’ve had close to blizzard conditions all day: high winds and heavy snow.

Carol and I went home after church, had lunch, and sat around updating our respective Web sites. By four o’clock, I was getting a little stir crazy. “Let’s go for a walk,” I said. We could see blowing snow outside our windows, so we bundled up.

We walked down to the end of State Pier. Blowing snow kept visibility very low.Looking across the harbor, we could see some lights on the Fairhaven side, and I just barely made out the ghostly profile of the Unitarian Universalist church’s spire.

We didn’t walk around much; the wind was too fierce, driving the snow right into our faces, blowing cold air into our heavy coats. We mostly looked at all the fishing boats tied up, an unusually large number of them in port, riding out the storm.

I noticed something out in the water. “Look!” I said, “a seal.” Carol spotted two more, and then we saw another two right up next to the pier, and another two; maybe eight all told. The two up close to the pier poked their heads up, looking around, looking at each other nose to nose (it almost looked like they were kissing). Another one rolled in the water close by, and when I took a step forward to get a better look, it slapped its tail on the water and dove down out of sight. I’ve never seen so many seals in one small area in New Bedford harbor; perhpas they, too, are riding out the storm in a safe port.

As I was crossing the swing bridge on Rt. 6 on a walk across to Fairhaven this afternoon, something caught my eye in the water to the north of the bridge. It turned out to be a harbor seal lolling in the water right next to the pilings that protect the bridge when has swung open to shipping. We have seen seals near the hurricane barrier, but this seal was in the middle of the busy part of the harbor. I watched it for awhile in the binoculars.

It stuck its nose up into the air, looking as if it were snuffing in a huge breath, then ducked under water. I thought it was gone, and walked on; but it surfaced again and seemed to look right at me with its big dark eyes. I watched it come up and go down a few more times, until it went under with a splash of its tail, disappearing behind some pilings. I walked on, thinking: New Bedford is lucky to have large wild mammals in the heart of the city.