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Just because a girl rescues and then names a couple of Mallards and contributes money to their food fund doesn’t mean said ducks are going to curl up and play cozy. The farm’s owner teases me that it’s because my clothes smell like the mean non-duck at home—if Quack only knew that her invisible presence is scaring the feathers off Owen and Beru. She’d probably smile. If cats could smile.
Today, as with most Sundays, the farm buzzes with my bleeding-heart urbanite comrades in denim and khaki. After checking the barn job board, I shovel horse poop and rake leaves until my arms burn, followed by seed for the chickens and ducks and the new geese who aren’t interested in playing fair. For the record, geese do not have teeth but the serrations in their beaks, called tomia, can still make a
