Anyhow Stories, Moral & Otherwise

[salimondo]

Canon and counter-canon. Early on, the work of Hans Christian Andersen inspired much the same urge to panic in me that department store mannequins did. Later on, of course, my baby sister and I could spend a happy Saturday morning laughing it up at the expense of a campy early '70s TV version of "The Little Match Girl," and who wouldn’t enjoy the

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quacks like a duck

[salimondo]

There are worse stories, but there are also better ones. When boiled, the Duckling basically has two meaty bits on its bones: (1) you probably don't have it as bad as that poor duck so stop your crying (2) if you are simply patient enough and surrender, you will succeed.

Swallowing the first bit gives birth to pity and, by reflex, shame. Swallowing the second does indeed generate that quietistic worship of doom. And granted, the meat can be cooked up any number of ways, but in the raw, here it is:

"It would be very sad, were I to relate all the misery and privations which the poor little duckling endured during the hard winter . . . 'I will fly to those royal birds,' he exclaimed, 'and they will kill me.'"

And this may be valuable for that rare little swan whose egg somehow gets mixed up in the duck's nest. But what about the ducks who are unhappy and suffer silently and eventually decide to commit suicide by swan? I have a deep love of ducks. I have a deep love of swans. Few things make me happier than ducks who are working to be the best damn ducks they can be.