Duck Pond House

This house is located on a busy street which is perpendicular to the street I grew up on. The house is set back in off the road a ways and has a roadside pond which local ducks like to frequent. When I was growing up, I used to walk to the pond with my friend Greg when we didn't know what else to do, which was all the time. We would take Wonder Bread and rip pieces off to throw to the ducks who would eat them. There was often an old lady there who was doing the same thing. Eventually we got to know her and she started bringing more bread in order to give us bread to throw.

In the winter one year much later, when I was in high school, this kid on my street who was older than me, and more of a trouble-maker, decided to go ice skating on the pond even though it was on private property. He took a girl whom he was trying to impress with him and I think she fell in but climbed out and was fine. Sometime after that, they took down the old farmhouse-style wooden fence and put up a chain link fence.

I have never, in all my life, seen any sign of life or movement in or around this house. There is always a car in the driveway. I have never seen the owners. Every time I drive by the house and see the pond, I think about the old lady who used to bring us extra bread. I think about how she has probably since died, and I wonder about the circumstances surrounding that event.