Why I Read Happy Endings

If you’ve got a kid, chances are you’ve read him/her the classic Make Way for Ducklings. A daddy duck and a mommy duck go looking through the city for a place to lay their eggs. They setup in a lake, which seems to work out fine. But then the eggs hatch, and the ducklings cause quite a traffic jam as they walk through the streets. So the upstanding policeman makes a crossway for them, and everyone lives happily ever after!

So yesterday, I’m at my dad’s house eating lunch. I look out the window and see two smallish green ducks waddling by. I do a double-take, and wow, like 10 little ducklings are running behind them. Now, there is a lake in the neighborhood, but to get here they would have had to go near a very busy road with many lanes. And they seem kinda lost, just marching to the back of the yard and then huddling in a corner.

I’m thinking we’ve got to do something, so we call the city first, hoping they have some duck-handling staff who can cart the brood back to the lake. No, they say, they aren’t going to do anything. Next we call animal control, who says they specifically do not handle ducks. This takes a while and as my dad is on the phone, the two adult ducks fly up to the fence and look around. I think they were a bit confused about how to cart their kiddos to water, but then they flew away! Maybe they gave up (they seemed kinda young for adults, so this might have been their first go-round) or maybe they were going away to strategize and come back? That part’s probably wishful thinking.

My cat took a bird captive in our house a couple years back, so I knew about a wildlife rescue center in the city. I called in and they told me that since the parents left I had to bring the ducklings in. They need heat and food, and the adults have no way of bringing back food (it has to be foraged) even if they came back, so this has to happen or they will die. Did I mention my 4-year-old was feeling really needy right about then and felt the need to instruct me that as his mother I should be holding him to make him feel better? Eek!

Anyways, I got a box and went to the back for the ducklings. Already there seemed to be less of them, and as I advanced, they all ran through the fence to the neighbors – oh no! So I get the neighbor to open his gate (they all have these metal gates that are locked) and go back there, but they run back through. Okay, this time I close it off and go back to my dad’s yard. And they all run through the other fence. Ack!

Hijinks ensue as I run around like a crazy person. We had all the neighbors out and hunting for ducklings. I even had one guy in particular come to my aid, which would have been a fabulous meet cute if this were a romance novel and I weren’t married and he weren’t whatever, I don’t even know.

But here’s the thing. We found TWO of them. Two ducklings out of ten.

We really, really searched for the rest, but they had scattered throughout the backyards of the neighborhood. And they were so tiny! Here are the two we found:

I felt really bad about the other ducklings, still do. This started off like Make Way For Ducklings but ended… not so perfect. I did take the two ducklings to the wildlife center and they were very sweet there, so I’m sure they will take good care of them. However, there are still many ducklings missing and those two confused ducks flying around. Bittersweet, at best, which is real life.

I have heard some weird theories by people who don’t read romance (or particularly appreciate a guaranteed happy ending) about why I might like them. I must be stupid with an adolescent worldview. Sigh. I read one idea was that said the mores of our society dictate marriage or commitment so strongly that we need that to justify all that smexing. While I don’t agree with that (for me) that’s at least a thoughtful attempt.

But the truth is I see enough sad endings in real life. It’s not that I can’t handle dealing with bad endings, because I have done so plenty of times in my life. I don’t need to turn to fiction for that.