The Reluctant Twitcher by Richard Pope

Author:Richard Pope
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: NAT000000, NAT004000
Publisher: Dundurn
Published: 2009-09-20T04:00:00+00:00

Photo by Jean Iron.

Ross’s Goose. Reesor Pond. This attractive little goose is a welcome visitor in Ontario in the spring and fall migrations.

Oh, my God. My thrice-accursed computer has been down and I have not been able to check my email. Margaret tried to alert me. I look at my watch. Four forty-five. I could perhaps just get there in time, but would have to fight the traffic all the way back to Cobourg, miss supper, leave the lawn half-mown, and spoil Felicity’s evening.

I agonize. What to do? What would Coady do in such a situation? I ponder this for several seconds, but the answer is clear. Then I think of all the consequences and decide not to go. I’m not even a real twitcher. I am bogus.

I go back outside and begin fitfully mowing again. Two-ninety-one for Margaret keeps going through my head. I knew she’d pull ahead. And there’s no way that bird will hang around until morning. But I’ll still have to head out at 5:00 a.m. to be there for first light to maybe see a few white feathers where it will have taken off. I should have gone today. Any real birder would be on the 401 at 130 kilometres per hour right now. What a loser. Bet it’s a nice adult, too.

Margaret will be pleased. I try to tell myself how glad I am for her, but my joy seems oddly limited and even disingenuous.

Yet, I must be pleased for her. I am her friend.

At 6:00 p.m. the phone rings. I look at the call display. It’s Margaret calling to gloat. I can’t pick up the phone. Felicity picks it up.

“Hello, Margaret. What?” Pause. “Oh, dear. Oh, how disappointing. Yes, he’s right here. I’ll give him to you.”

There is a god. Margaret has dipped on the goose. My heart soars up like a skylark uncontained.

“Hi, Margaret. Did you get the goose? Oh, no! Oh, I’m so sorry. Bummer, eh? No sign of it? Oh, dear, what a disappointment. And all that driving for nothing! Yes, I know how busy you were. This’ll really set you back.”

Heh-heh.

We’re still even. I haven’t missed anything and I don’t have to get up with the hens tomorrow. I can relax and have a little glass of something red with my supper. Live a bit.

Everything has worked out for the best.

Only something is bothering me. What could it be? Deep down I know. It’s because I’m glad Margaret did not get the goose. I didn’t really want her to be disappointed, but I am pleased, well pleased, that she didn’t get the goose.

Whence all my schadenfreude (the malicious enjoyment of another’s misfortune)? And what kind of a person would experience such feelings for a friend’s misfortune?

The answer comes through with great clarity: not a very nice person — in short, a scumbag. What a time to discover that I am a knave. I’m sixty-bloody-five! I’d always pictured myself like the kindly, grandfatherly Lenin, smiling at the young cherubs gathered round his feet in my favourite Socialist Realist painting.

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