Duck Tales

Yackey was our pet male duck – actually rather soft-spoken when compared to his mate. I always believed that he was henpecked. For years, I took my triumphs and my troubles to him because he didn’t mind being stroked and talked to - didn’t even mind tears dropping his back on my childhood’s darkest days. He and Fluffy stayed in the creek or rummaged in the neighbors’ yards until we came to feed them.

One morning at school the principal called my name over the intercom with no explanation – just “Come to the Office.” I walked down those long tiled halls past the library and restrooms and lunchroom. There were never any lights on in the hall. I walked into the foyer to find Mr. Cravey standing beside his plants, the ones we never dared to touch. Without a word, he led me out the front door and there was Yackey, padding back and forth with that soft w-a-ack, w-a-ack of his, waiting to be admitted or to be acknowledged or perhaps even waiting to be educated as so many of us inside were waiting. Cravey said, “Is he yours? Make him go home.”

“I can’t sir – I’ll have to take him home.”

“Take him and come back” and Cravey was gone – no need for a parent dismissal, no phone calls for permission.

Yackey must have been relieved to find me, because he willingly followed. My dad delighted in saying that we only lived a block from the elementary school, but it was an endless block that day – me, in front, head hanging down, feeling ashamed for someone else’s actions; Yackey, behind me, asking quiet questions all the way home.

I suppose it was my first experience with parenting, poor parenting. Suddenly this dependent creature who shared in the daily events of my life had shamed me by pulling me into his own event, had made me accountable for his actions, and yet still trusted me enough to follow me even though I simply wanted to be rid of him and the embarrassment he had caused me. He continued to trust me in innocent ignorance of the fact that my unspoken, unrealistic expectations had been violated.

I thought of that walk last year when I wrote:

I’m not a very good parent tonight –
I keep wishing there was someone to call who had no idea
I even was a parent.
I hurt and tonight I’m overwhelmed with hurt –
I’m disappointed –
All that glittered didn’t turn out to be gold.

I’m ashamed
That I didn’t do better in the first place
That I screamed
That I got angry
And that I don’t know how to get to the real problem.