Ducks on the Pond

I look out over the pond. It is an odd occurrence of open water in our Minnesota January. I am curious as to why there was open water. Everything else I see is frozen: everything from my landscape to the personalities I meet, hot stove crabbies desperately waiting for the spring thaw. The pond is filled with ducks.

The phrase “ducks on the pond” has a special meaning to baseball fans, to my son and me. It means that there is a runner in scoring position, either on second or third base where there is a reasonable expectation that a runner can score on most base hits. 

Something exciting might just happen.  I look at the flock, bobbing on the water. There is a hint of expectation; what might happen? They seem excited, anxious that maybe the next duck to land on the pond will be the hit.

But my mind is elsewhere. The ducks all look the same from the office window from which I view them. Their anxiety produces no opportunities, no epiphanies, and no Emmanuel-like swans. They are all gray-looking. I look again. They are all the same. In my anxiety, I suddenly realize I am hungry.