Ducks in a Row

This week I’m getting all my ducks in a row. Every ducks is a moving duck, so better duck: duck-stuff’s a’ flying. Well in our case Rob-duck-stuff is moving in a big duck truck, not really flying per se, but don’t let that stop you; you should still duck.

Our stuff is flying and we don’t know where.

That makes duck lining a tough thing to get down. How do you make a line to nowhere? Right now I guess it’s more of a circle-line than line-line. Our stuff is a ring of dropping ducks around your coffee cups.

Remember those shooting gallery tin-ducks, ducking off the edge of a conveyer only to reappear on the other side? Well, while those vision tins of painted-ducks dance through your head, picture each duck with a box on its back. You’d think the box would slide off tin-duck like water off a ducks back, but it doesn’t. It just come back up the other side. Same ducks. More boxes. Never ending.

Endless ducks in endless row carrying endless boxes. Our boxes. Our stuff. Our Ducks.

Leading those ducks over the edge are our duck scouts. Our ducks scouts are portrayed by Ma and Pa Pirate Queen. Think of the pirate parents as the Lewis and Clarke ducks exploring the Michigan wilderness for the new Rob and PQ homestead.

The pirate parent duck scouts are the old wise ducks, pa duck the old duck, ma duck the wise duck. Picture Gandalf the grey duck and Elmer the Fudd duck waddling from open house to open house like traveling pilgrim evangelist ducks.

“Have you heard the good news? RobBlogger may be moving here!”

This line of duck talk will probably get me Dick Cheney buck shot.

“Wobby season!”

So I’ll continue.

The Queen and I wanted to be house ducks. We’ve acquired whole lots of duck stuff and we need a duck nest to house it. A house nest holds more duck stuff than an apartment nest does.

QED.

Storing boxes means moving boxes and all our storage needs require a flock of moving packages. Some find the duck boxing daunting. I don’t.

Aim for the bill. I don’t know what that means. Go ahead and reread it. You’ll figure something out. I’m sure it refers to the expense moving. Moving isn’t about the moving price though. Moving is about the moving experience.

You know what? For all the times that I’ve moved, I don’t mind being moving ducks. It’s better than being sitting ducks, and like many other life events, moving a thoughtless moving task. If someone shoots the box out of my hand, it’s done. There’ll always be another box to replace it in the next circular revolution.

In our revolution, Lewis and Clarke ducks scouted prime landing sites. Unfortunately Michigan homes are swooped up by other migrant ducks undergoing America’s economic resettlement before we can quack an offer. Squatters thwarting our manifest destiny. I offered a solution:

“We’ve bring you blankets.”

The Pirate Queen said no.

This moves us across the line to apartment ducks. That means more of our duck stuff is duck dropping and not duck coming. Can we survive that?

I dunno. I line a deep nest, but I’ve been lining my nest with Thoreau lately. All that box duck stuff just weighs us down. If we didn’t have stuff, we wouldn’t have to move stuff. I’m burdened by a duck conveyer of my own making.

Time to cut ducks and trim fat. I’m the judge jury and executioner of all things Rob-ducky and I’m knee deep in duck stuff. I have to evaluate if every duck should stay or go. I’ve kept and coddled these ducklings for 15 years. Is it time to let them fly--if for no other reason than that there’s one less duck in the row?

And the ducks I reject may haunt me forever.

“Out! Out! Damn spotty Daffy rug!”

My feathers are more than a little ruffled and there are other ducks besides stuff ducks to line against the wall. This is my quacking orchestration. Power ducks, gas ducks, phone ducks, travel logistic ducks all need to be set into motion. If the right ducks don’t tow the duck line, my duck row could look like British teeth. Or even worse, I may lose all ducks altogether.

Duck season. Heh, heh, heh, heh…

Sigh...

I’ve spent 43 years accumulating and moving my ducks. I’ve done it longer than any career I’ve held. I take my ducks personally.

I’m a ducking professional.

The first time I moved, it was a great adventure; stepping out into the world, becoming my own drake. I didn’t have much more than a room to move so it was pretty easy.

The next time I moved I wasn’t as eager but it was still fun. I had friends, beer and pizza to keep the duck-walk moving.

Then next move I grew a new appreciation for Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. Oh, I still don’t enjoy the story, but burning a pile of books before a move now seems benevolent.

Today, moving is no longer about the adventure, it’s about the drudgery.

As a kid, the first time I saw a duck it was a ducking new experience. The duck might as well be a unicorn, cuz that duck was a first duck. As I got older, each new duck becomes just another duck packed together in a flock of ducks.

This time my duck walk leads to a duck apartment. The Queen has landed with a lease in bill and we’re moving on. Now my ducks are all moving ducks. I’m done. I’m tired. It’s no longer about the great adventure on the other side ( and I assure you, for a SoCal boy moving to Michigan, it is a great adventure), it’s about the same-ol’ same-ol’ process that gets me there.

Oh, I’ll snap out of my repetition, just as soon as the Rob ducks get on the road. Until then, well…everything is just ducky.

Detroit or bust.

Location.

Location, location, location.

Ask any Realtor and they’ll tell you it’s all about location. Bull riders agree; the location on the bulls back is far more agreeable than the location on the bull’s horns.

Earthquakes are about location. You don’t have them everywhere. We have them here. That’s our location. Location, location, location. We say it three times because we’re trying to point out a location while the earth is shaking.

Earthquakes teach you three things about location. One: any structure built on any location will come down after enough shaking. Two: a location’s value isn’t permanent. Three: location is more than location. Location is people, place, and atmosphere. They’re everything that makes a location a Location. After the Northridge earthquake, I lived in a Location built on rebuilding. People grouped together, standing on the shoulders of what had collapsed, and reached upward. The night the earthquake fell was pitch and flat, but the day after, a Location rose from its knees, determined.

The next week we forgot the whole thing, and started hating each other again, but that’s LA. It’s all about location, and earthquakes.

Tornados don’t care about location. In fact, they’re all about location redistribution.

“My house was in this location, now it’s in that location…”

Tornados are more about timeliness.

So am I.

What good is a good location if your timeliness is bad? Any swimming pool is a great summer location, until Mrs. McGitche’s third grade class shows up to pee in it. That’s just bad timing--and too much lemonade.

“The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee...." 

I’ve spent almost twenty years in this SoCal location. Sometimes my timeliness has been great, other times my timeliness has been pee pool poor. Ask MyEx. She’ll tell you.

Talk to my queen, she’ll say she loves my timing. She’s not wild about my location. My queen hales from the land where the timing-tornados are great and the location-lakes are greater.

"’Superior,’ they said, ‘never gives up her dead when the gales of November come early…’"

Timing, timing, timing.

Timing is not a SoCal concept. For me, timing and finding employment in this location is like locating a snowball’s timing in Hell. I’ve knocked on every door at every location not selling french fries. My timing syncopates with opportunity’s knocking rhythm. Call me the little match girl.

No, really. I’m trying to start a trend. Trends are all about timing, and LA needs a new one.

My queen started a trend; she got a new job. Yeah, I can’t find a job needle in a unemployment stack, and she can’t shake her peg leg without stepping in one. This time she stepped in something big and squishy and it stuck.

It’s all about timing.

We’re moving.

And location.

Timing and location, I’m beside myself. And myself is leaving California.

It’s weird. For all the great leaving Los Angeles songs, I never thought that I would ever sing one. I’ve left LA before, but I’ve always returned. This time, I don’t think so. This time, the change of location song sings with the tones of permanence, like the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, only I don’t know these words.

‘At seven P.M. a main hatchway caved in; he said, ‘Fellas, it's bin good t'know ya…’"

Yeah, shut up Gordan. Nobody likes a six-minute and thirty-second know-it-all.

Location. I chose this location almost twenty years ago. I stood on the great ship LA, and here I stayed even when everything nearly capsized, and staying didn’t seem like what I wanted. It’s been a love/hate bull-ride relationship. I’ve taken the butt. I’ve taken the horns. Now I’m taking my leave.

“The church bell chimed 'til it rang twenty-nine times…”

Goodbye Southern California.

I won’t miss much, but I will always miss your location.