A “gaggle” of memories flies about geese. Of course, that isn’t grammatically correct, but using it is such fun! I remember studying farm animals in our homeschool and how we giggled at the idea of a gaggle of geese, as a group of them is called.

          In fact, most of my geese memories involve laughter. One vacation in Potter County, PA, we visited Ole Bull State Park for a hike and a picnic. A wide creek runs through the park. We walked out on the bridge separating the picnic area from the campground to check out the fish swimming under the bridge.

      Photo courtesy of Janice Kelley. http://www.naturelegacies.com

           About twenty yards upstream, some Canadian geese floated on the creek. In a movement I’d never before witnessed, one goose upended itself in the water, totally vertical, its tail pointing straight at the sky. One by one, more geese followed suit. The sight of a half-dozen geese bottoms sticking straight up out of the water looked so hilarious, I dissolved in a fit of giggles. Giggles at gaggles again!

          The geese remained in their ungainly position for so long, I feared they’d drown. Then, pop! One righted itself. Pop, pop, pop! Soon all the geese floated as normal geese should. But before I could recover, more geese flipped over, tails waving at the sun. Another round of giggles, and another pop, pop, pop! I wanted to watch and laugh the day away, but Kevin insisted he’d had enough silliness and wanted to take our hike. I recall thinking they resembled ducks at a shooting gallery—up, down, up, down.

         One more smile-producing goose memory goes back even more years to when we lived beside a couple who farmed their small plot of land. They enjoyed working their garden together, growing most of their own vegetables. Often, we received overflowing baskets of corn or strawberries from their caring arms.

          Valeria, the woman of the house, fashioned decorations out of just about anything she could find. One year, she called me over to see her newest creation. She’d taken a neck pumpkin (not the jack-o-lantern kind, but the let’s-bake-a-pie kind) and turned it into a goose! She stood it up, painted eyes on the small head-end, painted the stem-beak black, and added a felt scarf around its neck. I smiled at her ingenuity and creative spirit. Set by our Ben Franklin stove with a few gourds tucked around his “feet,” he made quite a fetching fall display.

          So, yes, the mournful cries of a large V of geese flying south for the winter may be what many people think of with geese, but to me, I remember laughter—giggling at gaggles! I’m sure God laughed, too, when He taught them to turn upside down in the water and watched them go pop, pop, pop!

 *** Do you have a “gaggle” of goose stories? Even if just one, please, share your story! Click on the words beside the date of this post. Scroll down to the box with the heading, “Leave a reply.” Thank you for sharing!

 *** Can you guess next week’s post topic? Words associated with it: sour, sweet, bread-and-butter!