My partner and I headed out today to pick up our CSA share—Community Supported Agriculture. This means a couple of times a year we invest in a local farm, which in turn provides us with vegetables and fruit during the summer and fall. The official temperature was 88 degrees Fahrenheit, which is hot enough. The heat index, however, was a whopping 97. It was brutal but we carried on.
By the time we lugged our bounty to the car and went back into the farm market for some eggs and a few other staples, we were hot, bleary-eyed, and our pulses were elevated from the heat Fortunately, once in the car, it didn’t take too long to cool off.
We took the scenic way home, meaning we drove a number of random streets that we hoped would get us to our destination. We do this a lot. Finding new streets and landing in strange places is fun for us. Today’s journey took us by a pond. It captured our attention because it was right in the middle of a residential neighborhood. Driving by, our conversation went something like this:
Me: “Wow!” I point at the pond. “Cows are in the water!”
Her: Looking at me with a puzzled expression. “Those are mallards. They’re beautiful.”
Me: “Mallards? No, those were cows.” Getting concerned. “You didn’t see the cows?”
Her. “There were no cows.”
So, I turn the car around and drive by again.
Me: “See? Cows.”
Her: “I know my eyes are bad, but those are not cows. They’re ducks. Mallards.”
Me: “If those are ducks, I’m driving straight to the hospital.” I thought the heat had gotten to me and my brain was misfiring.
I turn the car around again. This time, I put on my hazard lights and drive extremely slow.
“Cows!” I point.
“Mallards!” She points.
We realize we’re pointing in different directions. Close to the road, under a tangle of tree branches, are a herd of black cows, just moseying around in the water. Across the pond under a different group of low-hanging trees is the biggest raft of ducks I’ve ever seen.
We looked at each other, eyes wide, and exploded into laughter. We were both right, but we’d been so focused on where our sight first landed that it never occurred to us to LOOK SOMEWHERE ELSE IN THE POND.
There has to be a moral to the story, right? But which one:
You miss out on big and small things when you don’t pay full attention?
Don’t sightsee while driving?
Be open to possibilities?
Heat exhaustion is real?
Oh, well. At least no trip to the ER was necessary. Has anything like this ever happened to you?
