Reflections from the Swamp
Dear Reader
The winter of your life won’t last forever. And you know the good news? After winter, there’s always spring. How do I know? The geese told me so.
We live in such uncertain times that our feelings about the future are, at best, mixed. No, we are not foolish. That feeling you experience of “something is about to happen” is because something is about to happen.
Our desire to live secure and stable lives stimulates the anxiety about tariffs, the economy, and jobs. Our survival instinct is stirring our curiosity and creating an adventurous spirit that leads us to seek alternatives to how we have always done things.
Something inside us has changed. Our neighbour to the south is less of a friend and has turned against us and themselves. We are developing a new collective personality to help us face the storm together.
The experience of uncertainty stimulates my creative spirit and survival instincts. This innovative spirit helps to get me out of the storm. Cheer up; you are very close to sunrise and the beginning of spring.
Many of us with a spiritual outlook hold beliefs that aren’t scientific or provable. Carl Jung believed in the central importance that many rituals, symbols, and beliefs, even if not scientifically accurate, speak to an inner connection to The Divine.
One of my beliefs is that the Canada Goose has a spiritual significance in being the messenger from the heavens of the coming of spring and new life. All life rejoices (except golfers) when the Canada Geese are gleefully trumpeting in the skies. The trees begin to leaf, and the frogs join the geese in expressive joy. Flowers bloom, bikinis and flipflops liberated from the bowls of closets see the light of day.
Goose Lottery 2025
My bride and I have conducted a Goose Lottery in The Millstone for several years. There is no cost to enter. Participants must guess when the first Canada Goose will land on Corkery Pond. I can see Corkery Pond from my living room window.
I love this job because I sit on the pond in my lawn chair, sip tea from my thermos, ignore the lists my bride makes for household tasks, and wait for the geese to arrive. Somebody has to do it, and I like doing my part to bring on spring. Despite the lawn chair and afternoon naps, I envision myself as a man of action. Like most government workers, I am more productive working from home after a midday nap.
You have to pick a date and specify morning or afternoon: submit your guess via this online form: https://forms.gle/VykZnLwWdVuCPSwR9
All entries must be in by March 14th.
If two participants pick the exact date and time, I will select the first entry received and place the second entry as close as possible to their chosen date.
The first prize is a 1967 Canadian silver dollar with a portrait of a Canada Goose flying on the front. The second and third prizes are five pounds of goose droppings that can supplement your garden soil or be used as a unique potpourri if you live in an apartment. All 2nd and 3rd place winners in the past just wanted their certificates and suggested that I donate the goose droppings to a worthy cause. The generosity of our community touches me. Any child, twelve and under, with the closest date to the landing of the goose, also wins a silver dollar.
1st, 2nd and 3rd winners receive an official certificate acknowledging their winning and prophetic powers. Remember to mention your prophetic powers on your resumes, especially if you apply for financial management, stock market work, or writing horoscopes.
Due to the importance of the Goose Lottery in bringing spring to Almonte, I’ve been negotiating with the Mayor of Almonte to have a bronze statue of the winner placed beside the seated statue of Naismith in the town centre. So far, I’d say our trade negotiating with our neighbour is more likely than getting a bronze statue in Almonte, but hope springs eternal. Weather permitting, we may have to settle for a snowman or snowwoman.
Here are some essential hints for picking a date. In the past eight years, the first goose landed between March 10th( last year) and April 27th. Geese appear in Almonte before coming to the pond. Last year, I fell through the ice on the pond in February; one could drive a train across the pond this year.
Usually, the geese will land on the pond, even if there is ice, to check it out—visits to the pond count as landings. Geese often fly over the pond or land in a nearby cornfield; these sightings don’t count. A new variable has appeared during the past four years, namely swans. Geese don’t like swans and may take a pass on landing if too many swans occupy the pond.
Help bring spring to Corkery and Almonte by entering the contest.
May the geese land in your favour.
Richard van Duyvendyk
