Family Tragedy

It was a poignant moment in the flash of a few seconds as I drove on Golf Road in Rolling Meadows during rush hour Friday. A family of Canada geese not unlike the one pictured here had apparently just crossed the road. Golf Road in that area is a stretch of four-lane, divided highway with a speed limit of 45mph past an office park on one side and a forest preserve on the other.

The drama unfolded in the seconds it took me to approach and pass the geese. One of the babies had straggled or perhaps struggled at the curb and was run over by a passing car. The rest of the family was standing in the grass next to the curb. A couple of the babies stood at the edge and looked at the suddenly flattened corpse of their sibling. One adult goose pressed onward in the direction away from the road, with some of the goslings in tow. The other adult looked at the dead bird on the pavement with a sort of bewildered thrust of its head toward the flattened, lifeless form.

I didn't witness the death of the baby bird, but only this aftermath and, as I mentioned, in only a few seconds. But those few seconds are burned into my soul for the moment, and the sadness I felt for that adult goose — most likely the mother — as she looked on helplessly at one less chick in her brood.



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