It's a pack of woes that besets humanity in the fall of 2022. Might I list some? A stubborn pandemic about to enter Year 4, a tragic, unwinnable European war, a raft of freakish weather disasters without end, harbingers of the global economy in a skid a la 2008, but with any bailout money already spent, and visibly suffering individuals everywhere, for whom we must not avert our eyes.
What to do? I looked around and saw our feathered friends, who also have to get through these cold months. I found a renewed purpose feeding them.
The ducks at Laurelhurst Park, about a two-mile bicycle ride from my place, I've been feeding Sunday mornings for about six months. They see me at the edge of the lake and then it's a series of quacks, frantic paddling, and some flying and before long 50 customers are ready.
They love frozen peas. I bring a bag, open it and toss the green morsels on the ground. Ducks leave not a single one. They waste no food. And if I offer some in my hand to a duck, they are quickly snapped up, except without any pinching of my hand. I can't explain how the spoon-billed, toothless duck seemingly vacuums frozen peas off my hand. I also bring a bag of old-fashioned oats. Like peas, a healthy choice. Ducks will micro-clean all of these off the ground, Minutes later, the ground has no trace of oats.
There's a variety of ducks present, if the mallards tend to look alike. The others, with distinctive appearances, I’ve started to name. One with a white head, white neck, I call Seego (as the seagull he seems from neck up). Charlie is a deep ebony black with streaks of iridescent greens. Speckles is--you guessed it--mostly black with many white dots upfront. Possibly the largest duck is Tan Girl (named by a fellow duck feeder, who once saw her with ducklings) and she's white with a crimson/sunburn-ish head, neck, bib and some wing feathers. A real duo-tone gal!
But ducks are pragmatic: When the food's gone, they take off across the lake, some paddling, some flying after they waddle away.
Invariably one of the high-spirited ducks will utter a quack that can be heard everywhere in the park. I don't know if it's a thank-you, but it definitely sounds like an exuberant, maniacal chuckle.
And if ducks are the takers of free food, what do we get in return? The one time I talked with a fellow feeder, he confessed he'd lost his dad only the month before. He said feeding the ducks at Laurelhurst Park helped the grieving and was getting him through our tense times. Yes!
Image credit: author photo @ Laurelhurst Park
Read Charlie Dickinson's story collection The Cat at Light's End, as an ebook in these downloadable formats:
.mobi (Kindle)
.epub (most other readers)
.pdf (for PCs)
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