I'm quite a fan of your style, not to mention your deed. It's straightforward and honest. You have a good sense of self while writing it; for instance "My heart broke" and your internal thoughts. And lovely if tragic ending.

Now feedback..

Add a bit to scene setting. I find myself curious about the weather at the beach or if anyone else was there. Then about your hotel room and the bathroom sink and whether the soap was a bar or a little bottle. And how did you get back to your hotel? What was the vet's office like? And the nurse?

Give a better sense of the bird before he's fluffy and playful, along the lines of his gasping for air. What was he doing on the journey back to your hotel? What was his coloring and his posture? How did he feel through the flannel? Did he try to spread his wings or try anything else? Did he make noise? Dive into your impressions and budding relationship with/understanding of this bird.

"a treacherous journey" Wait, what? What was treacherous? That's a big word to drop and walk away from.

The death is sudden and a mismatch from your story telling. It's all your perspective, but then you suddenly tell the reader the bird is dead before you knew yourself. Keep us with you as you tell.

Bullet-points and nits: - "The first time I experienced death first-hand": 2 of your first 7 words are "first" - "Point Arena, an area that felt uncomfortably remote": but what is it? a decrepit former coal town? a wind-carved alcove? a charming one-gas-station truck route stop? - "caught word of a nearby beach where you could APPARENTLY see the San Andreas Fault": apparently? is there a reason to doubt? was the source untrustworthy? just delete the word - "instead a strange ball of string rolling around in the surf. It was a good-sized seabird": no transition. add some sort of "As I got closer I saw it was..." or somesuch rather than just "it was a ball of string. No! It was a bird!" - "I wondered if birds can be suicidal": if birds COULD be suicidal"