him. He realized he was just like that duck. All his life he had been out in the world alone while the rest of the world swam by, happy in their own flock, knowing who they were and where they belonged.
Oswald was feeling a little sad these days anyway. Christmas was just around the corner, and Betty was already playing Christmas carols on the radio. He supposed it put some people in a good mood, but all those “I’ll be home for Christmas” and “There’s no place like home for the holidays” songs just made him feel lousy. For him, Christmas had always been a season with everything set up just to break your heart. As a kid, all he had ever gotten were cheap toys handed out by a bunch of once-a-year do-gooders, toys that by the next day were either broken or stolen. Even as an adult, when he had spent the holidays with Helen’s family, it just made him feel more of an outsider than ever. Each year was the same; all her brothers and sisters would sit around, looking at home movies and reminiscing about their wonderful childhood Christmases. No, Christmas for him had always been like someone shining a great big spotlight down in that dark empty space inside him, and the only way he had been able to handle it in the past was to get drunk. A hangover was nothing compared to feeling all alone in a roomful of people. This year he would be spending what could turn out to be his very last Christmas on the river with the birds and ducks. That, he guessed, was better than nothing.
The next time Oswald went in the store he found himself eyeing the cartons of beer stacked over in the corner and was almost headed over there but when Betty Kitchen came in, he decided to stick to his original plan and asked Roy if there was some kind of book he could get so he could try and figure out what kinds of birds and ducks he was looking at. Roy said, “Come on back in the office with me, I think I have something for you.” The office was a mess, with stacks of papers and old ledgers and Jack’s toys everywhere, but Roy rummaged through a pile on the floor and handed Oswald an old ripped paperback copy of
Birds of Alabama: A Birdwatcher’s Guide.
“May I borrow this?” asked Oswald.
“Oh hell, you can have it. I don’t need it.”
Oswald took the book up to his room. While he was thumbing through it, he found an old postcard from 1932 that described Lost River as
A magical spot, invisible from the highway by reason of its location in masses of shade trees, along the winding banks of the river, where it lies in a setting of flowers and foliage and songbirds, like a dream of beauty ready for the brush and canvas of the landscape painter.
That’s the damn truth, he thought. It
would
be a great place for a painter or a birdwatcher. Then it dawned on him that he, Oswald T. Campbell, was actually studying to become a birdwatcher. Birdwatching was certainly not one of the things he would ever have put on his THINGS TO DO list. As a matter of fact, he had never even had a THINGS TO DO list, and now it was almost too late to do anything. Oh, well, he thought, live and learn. Better late than never. And then he wondered why in the hell he was thinking in clichés.
From that day on, after he had gone down and had a cup of coffee with Roy and shot the breeze with him for a while, he would take his birdwatcher’s guide and go down to the river and try to match the birds he was seeing with the pictures in the book. So far he had identified a great blue heron that cracked him up by the way it walked. It picked its feet up and down as if it were stepping in molasses. He had seen cranes, a snowy egret, mallards, wood ducks, and a belted kingfisher, and by December 19 he had already identified his first pileated woodpecker. He was hoping to see an osprey one of these days.
On the morning of December 22, when Oswald walked over to the store for coffee with Roy, he saw that the huge cedar tree outside the community hall had been
Oswald was feeling a little sad these days anyway. Christmas was just around the corner, and Betty was already playing Christmas carols on the radio. He supposed it put some people in a good mood, but all those “I’ll be home for Christmas” and “There’s no place like home for the holidays” songs just made him feel lousy. For him, Christmas had always been a season with everything set up just to break your heart. As a kid, all he had ever gotten were cheap toys handed out by a bunch of once-a-year do-gooders, toys that by the next day were either broken or stolen. Even as an adult, when he had spent the holidays with Helen’s family, it just made him feel more of an outsider than ever. Each year was the same; all her brothers and sisters would sit around, looking at home movies and reminiscing about their wonderful childhood Christmases. No, Christmas for him had always been like someone shining a great big spotlight down in that dark empty space inside him, and the only way he had been able to handle it in the past was to get drunk. A hangover was nothing compared to feeling all alone in a roomful of people. This year he would be spending what could turn out to be his very last Christmas on the river with the birds and ducks. That, he guessed, was better than nothing.
The next time Oswald went in the store he found himself eyeing the cartons of beer stacked over in the corner and was almost headed over there but when Betty Kitchen came in, he decided to stick to his original plan and asked Roy if there was some kind of book he could get so he could try and figure out what kinds of birds and ducks he was looking at. Roy said, “Come on back in the office with me, I think I have something for you.” The office was a mess, with stacks of papers and old ledgers and Jack’s toys everywhere, but Roy rummaged through a pile on the floor and handed Oswald an old ripped paperback copy of
Birds of Alabama: A Birdwatcher’s Guide.
“May I borrow this?” asked Oswald.
“Oh hell, you can have it. I don’t need it.”
Oswald took the book up to his room. While he was thumbing through it, he found an old postcard from 1932 that described Lost River as
A magical spot, invisible from the highway by reason of its location in masses of shade trees, along the winding banks of the river, where it lies in a setting of flowers and foliage and songbirds, like a dream of beauty ready for the brush and canvas of the landscape painter.
That’s the damn truth, he thought. It
would
be a great place for a painter or a birdwatcher. Then it dawned on him that he, Oswald T. Campbell, was actually studying to become a birdwatcher. Birdwatching was certainly not one of the things he would ever have put on his THINGS TO DO list. As a matter of fact, he had never even had a THINGS TO DO list, and now it was almost too late to do anything. Oh, well, he thought, live and learn. Better late than never. And then he wondered why in the hell he was thinking in clichés.
From that day on, after he had gone down and had a cup of coffee with Roy and shot the breeze with him for a while, he would take his birdwatcher’s guide and go down to the river and try to match the birds he was seeing with the pictures in the book. So far he had identified a great blue heron that cracked him up by the way it walked. It picked its feet up and down as if it were stepping in molasses. He had seen cranes, a snowy egret, mallards, wood ducks, and a belted kingfisher, and by December 19 he had already identified his first pileated woodpecker. He was hoping to see an osprey one of these days.
On the morning of December 22, when Oswald walked over to the store for coffee with Roy, he saw that the huge cedar tree outside the community hall had been
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