Ode to the inconvenient

Waiting for my car along a busy stretch of highway in Norwood, a flock of sociable geese just made me laugh.

Such living beauty on a patch of green sandwiched between the racing speedway known as Route One and the mundane flats of black pavement for commercial parking at this mall. They seemed oblivious to the noise and commotion, content to enjoy their little patch of greenery.

I watched their striking black necks and admired the natural order of everything they did. They even seemed to be standing in vee formation, their eyes fixed on their leader, who stood erect with his eye alert to my approaching. A couple times a few of them on the outskirts would chase each other with outspread wings and nasty beaking, but then they would settle down and resume their grazing. How like people they seemed, this little flock.

There’s so little natural wildlife in these parts, it’s a shame that people don’t like them. At Choate Park even the elderly complain about how dirty they are. At Chilson they’ve polluted the pond and their droppings make the beaches unclean for children to play in the sand. I’m told that they are a constant irritant to golfers and landscapers. No one seems to know a solution because just as soon as you chase them away they return to another spot. One older gentleman at Honeydew was telling me that they’re going to have to start shooting them off. What a shame. We should at least have a roast goose Thanksgiving dinner for the poor in the town, I suggested.

Another natural problem was on the news this morning from the state of Vermont. Though coyotes have been plentiful in the area, it’s now been reported that someone shot a ninety-pound WOLF on the border! The reporter said that there haven’t been wolf sightings in the area for a hundred years, but that seems unbelievable. I wonder how often they are mistaken for coyotes.

It’s a little easier to understand the fear of wolves, than the hatred for the geese that are here for such a brief time and then fly south.

We are a generation who hates to be inconvenienced. We are a people who don’t want to be bothered to clean up messes. We like our yards perfectly manicured, our golf ranges uncluttered, and now, even some of the last remaining wilderness regions to be free of the free and wild.

We Americans, of all people, are accustomed to the most unrealistic expectations on the planet.


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