I Never Allowed Myself to Swim… Or how Goose Privilege, Species Prejudice, and Water Fowl Are Destroying The American Park System.

Today was a decent day. I played with myself. I went to work and had some of the Kool-Aid that pop culture provided for me. I sat around the office and did absolutely nothing except for surfing on Facebook for at least six hours, writing post about how I am so underprivileged and about how geese are destroying the world. I ate lots of junk food and inhaled the fart-filled air of my coworkers. For some reason my boss is questioning my efficiency — but that could be the six hours I spend online. But that’s my goal, daily.

It’s also important to note that I have 99 problems and a bitch ain’t one. I’ve told myself that I should write about these problems, but I’m not sure if people want to read about my whining. But… I’m going to write this anyway. And just a warning… this article may meander a little.

Yep, I’m that guy who hopes that my dog will one day count to 10 while learning how to sit. This is probably an unfair expectation because I was shitty in school. I was never able to understand the meaning of the word hypocrisy.

And unfortunately, I don’t have the attention span of my dog. You see, after training, my dog was able to ignore (or politely engage) the Canadian geese with which we share a trail each and every morning. Yet they get stuck in my head — these geese. Oftentimes, I will become lost in my head thinking about how geese attacks are like margarine (not exactly sure what this has to do with anything.) But anyways, those geese… well they totter up in a somewhat reluctant but aggressive, aggressive manner… And you know they’re just thinking that they are better than you, that they belong there more than you do. These geese, geese-ing around the pond trail, striving to be as nasty as the goose beside them, seem to enjoy charging people in hopes of claiming the abandoned food. I watch them walking around, raising their necks towards each other and snapping at each other’s wings. Or, how they go on the pond and swim around together: two at a time. All the while, you become paranoid that they are hissing things about your species under their breath. Sometimes, a goose will do worse shit like physically attacking picnickers in their midst (I’ve lost a few bran muffins this way.) And the park rangers may state that this park is the geese’s natural habitat, and that you only got attacked by “a few of the geese,” that you have to share the land, and that you shouldn’t judge them all so harshly. The park ranger might even think that the geese have the same right to be here, as they need a habitat with both land and a body of water in which to swim. What do you think?

I, myself, never learned to swim. I was never taught this. I was never taught to walk like a goose either, because my mother was too busy teaching me how to potty train and eat my food without making a mess. When I expressed the interest in walking like a goose, my mom sighed and told me that I needed to finish my dinner. Not sure why, but I also blame this on the geese. I so wanted to learn how to swim, but it was never on my radar. Living near a pond and tottering around like an attack fowl was never on my radar. I mean, I would always dream big, but I didn’t have a park ranger to grease the wheels — to make things happen for me. And who are these rangers anyways? Fat cats sitting around eating tofu while watching the National Geographic channel? The United States park system has crushed my dreams.

Of course my generalizing comments and intimated dislike for geese should in no way be considered anti-goose, because I perceive myself as a victim in this situation. This is despite the fact that I have lived a middle class life. Sure other humans have it worse, but because I identify with this species, I get to complain by association. Geese have it easier. They live that grass-is-always-greener life. Park Rangers may explain that, during migration, some Canadian geese must avoid various predators on their way to this pond. But lets focus on the geese have that lived relatively stress-free lives. These geese were born with the privilege of a well-protected habitat. And despite the fact that some of them are quite docile and friendly, I choose to lump all of them in with the assholes among their kind. And because I am able to perceive my own reality, I can ignore these facts and avoid sounding hypocritical. After all, pop culture affords me this privilege… Oh wait, privilege is the exclusive domain of geese… I mean, pop-culture affords me the right. Doesn’t that sound better?

During the short period of time I have spent around geese, I have noticed them sunning most of the time. I would love to soak in the sun — if only I had the time myself. I’d also love to have the time to migrate, but I personally don’t have the attention span for that. I’ve got to go to work, talk to people, due paperwork, fill out my timecard, eat lunch, clear up my desk, gossip with co-workers, waste time on Facebook (see first paragraph,) get my stuff together at the end of the day, walk out to my car, get in the car, close the door, put on my seatbelt, adjust the mirror, put the car in reverse, step on the gas, press the brake, put the car in drive, turn the steering wheel, push the gas again, stop at lights/stop sign, drive into my parking space, put it in park, get out of the car, close the door, remote lock the car, walk up the stairs to my second floor apartment, take out my keys, unlock the door, close the door, strip down to my underwear, cook Ramen noodles for dinner, sit down on the couch with my noodles and a bottle of vodka, turn on the television, pass flippant judgments on the TV people until I get tired, and then cry myself to sleep thinking about my middle class life. Oh yea, and I feed my dog. It’s a funny thing; this concept of time. It’s yet other thing I can begrudge… like the 20-minutes-a-day that the aggressive geese spend attacking people during their two-year lifespans.

You see time is freedom. Freedom, freedom, freedom, freedom, and freedom. Freedom comes with feathers, with the ability to swoop down from the air and attack people. It cost the geese nothing but feathers, which the geese carelessly shed during moulting. And there is one goose, who is the worst of them all, the one who attacks innocent people and opens deep wounds which require stitches. I have given him a name: and it’s Brock Goosner. I think we can all agree that Brock is an evil goose and that the park ranger has not done enough to get rid of him. I am going to, however, gloss over the fact that most other geese have disavowed him… but that’s not important: every witch-hunt needs a scapegoat. Subsequently, we humans have decided to denigrate all geese by association — and at all costs… yep, in spite of the fact the majority of geese are powerless in this situation. It’s just the cost of sharing the same family, genus, and species as Brock. Granted, in the human world, this may be considered prejudice, but geese don’t count because we perceive them as different.

So, like I said above, when I get home, I shed my physical layers down to the underoos. It’s one of the many things I take an inordinate amount of time to do. You see, I am too busy swimming in my head — or undressing slowly — to remember that I can make time to swim for myself. Nevermind that though… I’m going to ignore anything that dilutes my warped and acrimonious worldview. Instead, I’m going to delude myself with the counter-intuitive belief that I’ve never been afforded the time to learn swimming. But, Brock Goosner and his ilk are allowed the time to swim freely on that lake. I dislike, and mistrust, anything that learns to swim so well… That is unless they are human like me.