LG, the hero of yesterday’s post, is a charismatic genius of a goose: he went from being a wild animal (of a sort which most people consider to be a pest!) to having a whole hobby farm organized around him for his own amusement. Of course there are geese at the opposite likability end of the spectrum….
My parents had this one asshole goose (he had a name too, but I have forgotten it). He was always cropping up in unexpected places hissing at you like a feathery viper and lunging at you. If you are a domestic goose, it is unwise to alienate your human liaisons. Sure, we look all innocent when we are handing out corn, but we are really giant axe-wielding tragic apes…insatiable, invasive, and dangerous. Apparently the other geese realized this and they didn’t want my parents to get any notions about how delicious geese are (by the way, geese are really really delicious…maybe the most delicious thing there is–like eating heaven, if heaven were a rich fatty poultry). Also, the geese didn’t like this jerk goose either, because he was a jerk to them all day every day. He messed up really badly at gooseatics and made everyone—human and goose–hate him, so, before the axes came out, the flock banded together and straight-up murdered him. When they were all at the pond, the other geese grabbed the jerk goose, and held his head underwater until he drowned.
“We were just minding our business…He probably just slipped.”
I know about all of this because my parents watched it happen. When it was obvious that gooseatics had turned sour and gone completely Roman, my father rushed down from the farmhouse to the pond, but he got there too late. The corpse of the hated goose was floating in the water and all of the other geese were looking extremely innocent & abashed as if to say, “Who us? We certainly didn’t murder anyone!” There was nothing left to do but transform the unpleasant goose into delightful cutlets, quill pens, and throw pillows. I have one right here (a goose quill pen, not a cutlet). I can use it for ink wash drawings or writing out inflammatory political treatises.
I mention all of this as a way of explaining why I find geese so fascinating. They are clever omnivorous, bipedal creatures which live for decades. They are sort of imperfectly monogamous, insatiably hungry, and prone to clans and squabbling (which can turn murderous). Does anything seem strangely familiar in this description?
…like looking in a mirror
7 comments
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April 9, 2015 at 11:39 PM
Beatrix
Well, I suppose some birds of a feather don’t flock together?
April 10, 2015 at 2:45 PM
Wayne
So it would seem.
April 10, 2015 at 4:11 AM
agnesashe
Perhaps all the geese thought the jerk goose was ill and it was a mercy killing?
April 10, 2015 at 2:52 PM
Wayne
William Shakespeare once said, “Sweet mercy is nobility’s true badge.” I don’t think the geese necessarily wear that badge all the time.
April 13, 2015 at 9:40 AM
agnesashe
Great quote – geese/humans not much difference then.
April 10, 2015 at 4:51 AM
Bob H.
I had a friend who was a duck named Gilbert when I was a child until my family decided to kill and ear him . Suffice to say I have been vegan since .
I love your succinct description of humans as tragic apes very apt.
April 10, 2015 at 2:50 PM
Wayne
I’m sorry to hear about Gilbert–that’s really rough. When I was growing up, we tried to choose which animals were pets and which were destined for the pot before we gave them names and got attached (so the poor animals were always on a very serious version of “American Idol” without knowing it). Loving animals and eating animals go together very strangely sometimes: you might be on to something with your veganism.