Bruce the Goose

Bruce didn’t always have a name. In the beginning he was just The Goose. And he was nasty — ‘assertive’ if it’s my brother talking. As far as I’m concerned, he still is. Nasty, I mean. (The goose, not my brother.) But ever since Bruce got a name, something’s changed in the way I feel about him. I like him now. This is how it happened:

My brother lives on a farm. At least it used to be a farm. Now it’s a lot of uncultivated land with pretty views, a pond full of beavers, assorted outbuildings, some chickens, a bunch of farm cats, and Bruce. Several years ago, someone gave my brother a pair of geese, possibly in trade for some service or a season’s worth of fresh vegetables, I can’t recall. But the point is that the two geese, one male and one female, came to live on the farm.

The pair had the run of the place, and run they did. In the fall they’d hang way out back at the pond, where the migrating wild geese stopped for a night or two on their way south. On sunny summer days you’d find them sitting in the shade near the driveway, ready to produce a cacophony of honks and squawks whenever someone came down the road. From inside the house it sounded like one of the dogs barking. Over time, in order to distinguish one from the other, we began calling the male Goosey and his mate, Mrs. Goose. Together, they patrolled the border, harassed the chickens, menaced the dogs and generally assumed…