Rubber Ducks Redux: Another Note from the Recent Paterfamilias

I have to admit, it’s a little frustrating.

Alright, let’s be perfectly honest: it’s downright infuriating.

But please, allow me to explain.

My loyal readers will recall the previously related tale of the Recent Paterfamilias’ Great Rubber Duckie Hunt. For weeks on end, the tireless hunt endured, culminating in mostly naught for much of that time, forcing this intrepid sportsman through the most difficult of urban terrain, including toy stores, convenience stores, and most harrowingly, one place that was at least loosely akin to a sex shop. And almost nowhere were those dastardly reclusive rubber ducks to be found. All in all, it proved a rather trying adventure.

Well, apparently, hunts of this sort are no longer the status quo. I have been stumbling on rubber ducks of all sorts and all sizes almost everywhere. Hanging above the soda section in my neighborhood supermarket. Next to the Phillips head screwdrivers in my local hardware store. Between the Cole Haan driving loafers and the Fit Flop Flip Flops in the shoe store. In the dentist’s office. In Pottery Barn. One might start to suppose that those ducks are beginning to multiply like rubber rabbits.

Naturally, it causes a person (namely, the Recent Paterfamilias) to ask himself certain questions, such as: What the hell? Why couldn’t I find these ridiculous floating things three months ago, and now, seemingly, they’re everywhere? Why is this? Is Spring really “that time of the year”? And is Summer “that other time of the year” when all the fruits of Spring’s “plantings” are due to spring forth, so to speak? Perhaps it’s an enormous conspiracy to keep any and all rubber ducks out of the evil hands of the prodigal Recent Paterfamilias. Perhaps I am not worthy to handle such floating fowl of an ersatz nature. Perhaps rubber duckies simply do not like me. Or maybe they are purely the most cloistered beings on the planet, and thusly tend to avoid all paterfamilial contact unless absolutely necessary. Who can say?

And why are they everywhere now? Was I that blind? Was I already suffering from sleep deprivation even before the infant’s arrival? Was I not looking in the right place? Or places? Or were they hiding? And are they now following me? Waiting around corners in locations where the normal and the otherwise sane might least expect to find rubber duckies? Like my local Barnes and Noble? Or the barber shop? Are they, indeed, stalking me, these silent, smiling, little yellow freaks?

Who can say? And will I ever know?

At any rate, these aforementioned silent yellow freaks are now everywhere. And when I see them hanging there, with those smug looks on their puckered orange beaks, they make me mad. They avoided me when I was looking for them, and now they’re all over the place. And when I did manage to find them before, during my hunt, I collected all I could, but now, due to my previous compulsion, I am finding it increasingly difficult to keep from acquiring them and adding them to my already unwieldy twenty-member flock. At a certain point, should this continue, I will have too many ducks, I will run out of room, I’ll have to get rid of furniture, I’ll have to forgo closet space, I’ll have to climb over miniature yellow mountains just to make it into the bathroom, I’ll be nothing but that crazy rubber duck man who lives on Rubber Duck Lane in an oversized rubber duck house that’s filled to the rafters with little rubber ducks. I’ll be forced to change my nom de plume from the Recent Paterfamilias to the Mad Duck Enthusiast (actually, has kind of a nice ring to it).

Photo found on womansday.com (an article featuring crazy collections)