Ducks in a Row (and maniacal driving)
I was driving my car along a popular river road this evening, blasting the tunes and enjoying my solitary little life here in rural New Brunswick, Canada when I saw the most adorable sight along the side of the road, to the right. At first, it was a bit of a blur (my eyesight is not exactly what it used to be, admittedly) but when I got a little closer, much to my delight, there was a mother duck and around a dozen baby ducklings crossing the road ahead of me. It was my great pleasure and honour to stop my car in the middle of the road in order to afford the little family safe passage. All the babies lined up behind the mother just as you would expect them to do and it seemed like the whole endeavour was going to go off without a hitch. I was beaming with joy, knowing I had arrived at the right place and right time to be the one to let them go by where other drivers might not have noticed them in time, perhaps. In a flash, however, things took a very dark turn. Suddenly, from behind me, a car came fast and furious and started to swerve around me in order to pass me, even though that stretch of road does not have a passing lane and it's all a yellow line from point a to point b, in this particular section of town. I was going to try to take a quick snapshot of this benevolent nature scene (and the successful crossing of the road by all) while I waited but this car came out of nowhere so fast it scared me, I threw my phone down and did the one thing I could think to do and that was to lay on the horn. I don't know what the driver of the other vehicle was thinking but I will give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they were either going so fast they could not make an immediate stop without hitting my car or they just didn't give a damn about traffic laws nor speed and passed me to prove they were completely lawless and beholden to none, especially not me and my fully braked Nissan. Either way, all I could see in my mind's eye is a rash of dead baby ducks and a bereft mother, therefore it appeared that no matter how things went, this person was going to have some deep regrets let alone explaining to do because there was at least half a dozen cars behind the both of us and you can be sure at least someone in that line knew this person and they would never live it down if they were responsible for slaughtering this little family by reckless driving. This region is too small for that kind of wildfire gossip to not spread in a heartbeat.
I was simply aghast. I kept honking the horn over and over but there was but mere milliseconds to respond. I was afraid to see it all unfold, but to my relief, the driver narrowly avoided the ducks by swerving a little to the left and then a little to the right and then back to the centre of the road, and so on. I held my brake and waited for this scene to resolve itself and I marvelled at how my act of good will towards this little family soon turned into a complete circus within the span of maybe five seconds. I could feel the eyes of the onlookers staring at the scene, wondering what had just happened. I looked ahead to watch that vehicle go and, much to their credit, they slowed down once they passed the babies and the mother and hesitated a little before moving on. It is my guess that they are angry with me, originally, but when they saw what I was doing, and what I was trying to protect, suddenly I was no longer the bad guy and the driver of that car miraculously avoided a really really bad situation because I had the presence of mind to warn them as best I could as to why I had stopped my car. It was a brilliant display of assumption versus miscommunication versus epiphany-style understanding all within the span of a moment.
I looked over to the left hand side of the road and it appeared as though the mother and her babies made it safe and sound to the other side, but just barely. I saw her looking over her little non-existent Duckie shoulder at us humans in our stupid cars and I swear I could hear her mumbling under her breath at us all. But who could blame her? It is a metaphor for life, don't you think?
I don't even want to think about what it would have been like if that car had hit a few of those baby ducks, let alone the mother. What a macabre scenario it would have been not to mention heartbreaking and sad. I think about my state of mind and the desire of my heart, in that instant. I wanted to just slow down to let these innocent animals cross. They were obviously on their way down to the river and all they needed was about 30 seconds to make it over that busy stretch of road. That was not too much to ask, as far as I was concerned. But, for some reason, it was way too much to ask for the vehicle behind me, for whatever reason. I won't be quick to cast the driver of the other car as a villain, however. Rather, I am going to assume they were late for work, or had an emergency, or perhaps they were texting when they should have been watching the road. All I know for sure is they were going way too fast and were not at all prepared for the allowing for the occasion of a family of ducks passing the road.
But isn't that just exactly where were are in this world? So busy and so distracted we fail to calculate for the everyday eventualities that can occur, especially eventualities such as me slowing down my vehicle to allow a family of animals to pass through. We are so wrapped up in our individual dramas, or crisis, or whatever the case may be, that a situation like this could have easily ended in a disaster that would have followed the conscience, let alone the reputation, of the driver of the other vehicle forever. And as for me? Well, I was feeling rather crest-fallen, thinking my efforts to offer a moment of sanctuary were totally erased by the person behind me. What does that say about our best intentions? I really don't know but I am glad that I was able to warn these folks in enough time that they avoided running over these adorable little puff balls. I wasn't even angry, just relieved. It was a classic situation of someone making a false assumption that could have lead to disastrous outcomes.
The commentary here is self-evident, but let me just underscore it anyway in case it is not obvious to everyone. This situation is symptomatic of a larger problem, where everyone is rushing so fast to get nowhere really quickly and in the throes of all this rushing around, innocent lives hang in the balance. It just reminds me to slow down, personally. Speed invites trouble on the road ways, therefore not obeying the speed limit invites risks and passing on a yellow line is an act of motor vehicle hubris we could all do without. The fact of the matter is, it would do us all a world of good to slow down a little bit and take in the natural world around us and even better still, it would be nice if we could chill out a little bit about each other. I can't say for sure, but I think the driver behind me was annoyed I had slowed down because at the initial point of hitting the breaks, I checked my rearview mirror and there was no vehicle immediately behind me. It seemed like this car just came out of nowhere. Maybe they had been speeding through that entire passageway and maybe they passed all the cars that were behind me. If that had been the case, I imagine these folks would have been run out of town if their reckless driving resulted in the killing of this little duck family. Thankfully, it didn't end like that, but it could have. There's a lot of proverbial baby ducks on the highway of life, so I just hope we can all remember that and slow down because no matter what you're doing or where you're going, I am positive you won't enjoy your destination too much if you hurt innocent animals (or people) along the way, needlessly.
Unfortunately, I was not able to get a snapshot of the duckies. I wish I could enshrine the look of disgust on the mother's face or put it on a t-shirt or something. It was priceless. You could see by the glint in her eye she was pretty fed up with the whole human race and with obvious good reason. All she wanted, and needed, was to get her little babies down to the water's edge and she had done her part, teaching them to line up in a perfect little row behind her. The rest was totally out of her hands, as it where. I am glad she and her babies made it safely across and I hope I played a part in protecting her, but at the moment I can't tell if I made things better for her, or worse. All I know is, it was my intention to help her.
What a strange event. It all unfolded in the blink of an eye. Surprise turned to delight and delight turned to horror and horror turned to relief, all in the span of a heartbeat. The world is a mysterious place when moments like these can grip you in their path, without warning. I guess that's just life, isn't it? Miraculous and horrifying all at once.
I don't have a picture of the ducks, as I mentioned, but I was on my way for a little bumble to my old stomping grounds in Moose Mountain, so I'll share a picture of that instead. In light of moments like these, I am reminded that it is not my nature to get overly worked up over personal slights, which is why I have been a willing participant in these bizarre events that have happened to me in my previous posts. I am not well-traveled and I am rather naive at times, but I am also well aware at how the world can be a truly messed up place and it's hard to know where to fit in let alone how we are supposed to feel about where we fit in. I just feel grateful my life has meaning for others, by hook or by crook, I am mostly just happy to be along for the ride for moments like these, when I can witness the angry expression on a mother duck's face as she observed how carelessly her precious babies were thrown in harm's way and I can see how similar her impression of this experience mirrors that of any human, let alone a mother, and in this way, I see how connected we all are and how much we share in common with the natural world and suddenly I don't feel quite so alone, despite the avalanche of distractions I must sift through, day to day.
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