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Rifftides

Doug Ramsey on Jazz and other matters...

Other Matters: Geese

January 8, 2010 by Doug Ramsey

This evening before dinner, I headed out the door to clear the wooly mind that resulted from too many hours at the keyboard. Five minutes into the walk, a flock of Canada geese the size of this one flew directly over me at about 200 feet.

Geese.jpg

There was nothing unusual about that. Flocks of geese fly over this valley most mornings, heading south, and most evenings, heading north. But it quickly became apparent that something extraordinary was happening. No sooner had the flock passed over than another appeared slightly farther east. As it faded from sight, an even bigger flight materialized west of where I now stood in amazement. Within twenty minutes or so, I counted sixteen V formations, some with a hundred or more geese, some with  50 or 60, a few auxiliary flocks with 25 or 30; a thousand or more birds in all. For a time honking filled the air from every direction as the winter twilight deepened. When there was no longer enough light to see them, I heard a final flock receding to the north, the leaders making even more noise to keep the formation together.
My guess is that these were not migrating geese, but permanent residents of the area, the ones we see year ’round on golf courses and along streams. After all, they weren’t heading south. Why so many of them flew nearly together rather than in their usual solitary flocks, I’ll leave to ornithologists. I am simply grateful for the timing of that walk.

Geese 2.jpg

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Comments

  1. Richard Mitnick says

    January 9, 2010 at 12:50 pm

    Thanks, this was a beautiful respite.

  2. Desne Ahlers says

    January 9, 2010 at 9:05 pm

    Lovely post. You’ve reminded me of a poem I’d long forgotten by Robert Penn Warren. Thank you for that reminder. Here it is (and then followed by something rather more prosaic…)
    Tell Me a Story
    [ A ]
    Long ago, in Kentucky, I, a boy, stood
    By a dirt road, in first dark, and heard
    The great geese hoot northward.
    I could not see them, there being no moon
    And the stars sparse. I heard them.
    I did not know what was happening in my heart.
    It was the season before the elderberry blooms,
    Therefore they were going north.
    The sound was passing northward.
    [ B ]
    Tell me a story.
    In this century, and moment, of mania,
    Tell me a story.
    Make it a story of great distances, and starlight.
    The name of the story will be Time,
    But you must not pronounce its name.
    Tell me a story of deep delight.
    =========
    And…


  3. Pat Remkus says

    January 18, 2010 at 3:01 pm

    I just went out for a walk and saw two very large groups of geese heading north. I mentioned this to my husband who said that he’s seen many groups heading north in the last week. This is so early, too early. But it was such a delight to watch and listen to them and to hope that spring might make an early entrance this year. I live in southern Illinois. I was happy to see your comments.

Doug Ramsey

Doug is a recipient of the lifetime achievement award of the Jazz Journalists Association. He lives in the Pacific Northwest, where he settled following a career in print and broadcast journalism in cities including New York, New Orleans, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland, San Antonio, Cleveland and Washington, DC. His writing about jazz has paralleled his life in journalism... [Read More]

Rifftides

A winner of the Blog Of The Year award of the international Jazz Journalists Association. Rifftides is founded on Doug's conviction that musicians and listeners who embrace and understand jazz have interests that run deep, wide and beyond jazz. Music is its principal concern, but the blog reaches past... Read More...

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Doug’s Books

Doug's most recent book is a novel, Poodie James. Previously, he published Take Five: The Public and Private Lives of Paul Desmond. He is also the author of Jazz Matters: Reflections on the Music and Some of its Makers. He contributed to The Oxford Companion To Jazz and co-edited Journalism Ethics: Why Change? He is at work on another novel in which, as in Poodie James, music is incidental.

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