Mother Goose

Here on the Zwanegatsedijk in the Netherlands spring is in full swing. We have two big picture windows overlooking a beautiful wetlands and lake full of all kinds of waterfowl. Right now the greylag geese are all busy brooding and hatching their young. In early-April we started seeing a parade of proud parents with their fluffy yellow goslings. At first glance they seem nonchalant as they peck the ground walking slowly through the field. However, at the slightest noise, the nervous couples will stop still, straighten their necks, and turn their heads. They must stay alert. The threat of crows, seagulls, and marsh harriers all too eager to snap up an easy meal is never far away. If other geese happen to get a little too close, the protective parents flatten their bodies, stretch out their necks, and with an aggressive squawk sprint toward the offender. If that doesn’t chase them away, they spread their wings and thrust their breast out as they flap and screech, maybe even bite. It’s not for nothing. Sometimes overnight a group of eight goslings will become five, or three will become one.

I’ve had my eye on one brooding mother goose. She has made her nest in a spot tucked safely between the reeds and the edge of a small pond. It’s hidden but I can see her from my window. I can’t remember exactly when I first noticed her, but she has been there a long time, perhaps six weeks. She has patiently harbored the multiple gale force wind storms, hail, and heavy rains we have had this spring. Week after week other mothers arrive with their newly hatched chicks, which seem to double in size every day. There have been so many new families that I have lost count. Through it all the mother goose in the reeds has remained steadfast in her nest. Earlier this week, I started to feel like she had been there an abnormally long time. Some mornings she barely moved and I wondered if she was still alive. I was beginning to feel like motherhood was not going to happen for her, but like her, I didn’t give up hope.

My daughter arrived yesterday for Mother’s Day weekend. She brought me the most beautiful tulips and roses from Amsterdam. She lives there now, but it hasn’t been that long since she left my nest. We made tacos for the first time in the Netherlands, all vegetarian Cuban-style rice and beans, sauteed mushrooms with sofrito, avocado, and a good Dutch cheese from our neighboring dairy farm. I watched her move around the kitchen with confidence and skill. I have often wondered whether I did enough as a mother to prepare her for life, but when I see her like this I can relax. She is good.

I am still adjusting to life without her. Some nights as I am laying in bed, I think about all of the nights I rubbed her tiny back to sooth her to sleep, and the feel of her small soft hands as they reached out to pull mine, always cold, to her hot cheeks. Her little girl vulnerability and the way she needed me gave my life a purpose. I wonder if I will ever stop yearning for those quiet tender moments with her. When my daughter was still little, my grandma used to say, don’t blink or you’ll miss it. I thought she was crazy, I was in the midst of the dog days of motherhood. As usual, grandma was right. Where did the time go?

The sun sets late in the evening now. As we were finishing our taco dinner, a beam of light from the setting sun caught our attention. We looked outside and saw the mother goose in the reeds moving around in her nest. She seemed to be cleaning it and tossing out bits of fluff and shell. She stood up, waddled into the water, and started to swim to the other side of the pond. I jumped out of my chair with an excited cheer and went to the window with the binoculars. There were some tiny little chicks moving in the reeds close to her old nest, but she swam to the far side of the pond without them and was eating grass with a goose I now realized was her mate. I was confused. How could she not care about the chicks after all of those long weeks, or were they not hers? Looking more carefully I saw a mother duck’s head peeking out behind some tall grass nearby. The tiny chicks could be her ducklings. They were smaller than the other goslings I had seen. I studied the markings on my mother goose so I could recognize her again outside of the nest. She had a darker head than most and a unique pattern of white markings on her sides. I also noted that her mate had a stripe across his breast setting him apart from the others. I thought perhaps she would go back and gather her baby chicks and I would see them all together in the morning. For the moment, I was just so happy for her. Her long wait on the nest was over and she was stretching her legs and wings, eating, and swimming. She was going to be ok.

As the sun set deeper in the sky we took a walk to check out her empty nest. There was one broken egg and one intact egg. It was curious, and not a great sign, but it meant she could have one chick. I kept my hope for her alive.

This morning I woke up and looked for her in the reeds the way I have grown accustomed to. Then I remembered she was gone. Suddenly everything seemed different. The weather had finally caught up to the calendar. Warm humid air blew in on the coattails of yesterday’s rain storm. There were so many new hatchlings. I started to look carefully at all of the geese eager to see if I could spot her little family.

There was a couple with one new gosling. I wanted it to be them, but it wasn’t. I kept looking. Then I saw her with her mate. I looked closely at the shape of the white markings on her side and his stripe. It was them, and they were alone, without a young one. My heart broke for her. All of those weeks of patiently waiting were followed by more weeks of hoping beyond all logical hope that the eggs would hatch. She did everything right, and bravely weathered the whole ordeal without a single complaint. I wondered what prompted her last night to finally let go of her hopes, stand up, and swim away? How did she know it was time? It is probably wrong to imagine that a goose feels grief, but I still wondered if she didn’t feel the sting of such a big loss. A mother’s instinct is strong and deeply embedded in the reptile brain. Yet, there they were, pecking at the ground. Nothing seemed out of the usual. Had I not known better they would have blended in anonymously with all of the others. Just then, I noticed a family with nine adorable, robust goslings waddling toward our pond from the neighboring field. How unfair.

It seemed poignant to me that my goose nesting in the reeds, the one that I had been so worried about, left her nest without hatching her chicks on the eve of Mother’s Day. She made me think about Mother’s Day in a different way. The proliferation of new life here on the dike made me wonder if it is only a coincidence that it falls at this time of year? Is Mother’s Day a celebration of fertility? For women who don’t have children, or who have lost a child Mother’s Day can be a painful time. Even for those of us who do have children, motherhood is complicated. The gifts we receive in this life are arbitrary. There is no way to make sense of the way nature deals her blessings and blows. What my goose taught me was that at some point all of us learn how to stand up from the nest we have been carefully tending, let go, and hopefully we swim and fly again, too. We are okay.