As I bridge between the two years (Im writing this in 2022, but it will be published in 2023) I decided to go back through my articles for the year and see if any other should be revisited. One needs my attention.
Last July, I stumbled into the world of Jeep Ducking. It’s a thing that happens primarily among Jeep owners who gift little rubber ducks to each other as a way to solidify the “tribal” feelings people who drive Jeeps feel for each other. I really loved the idea. I loved the origin story. It started in Canada from a person who was trying to turn a hostel encounter at the beginning of COVID from a negative to a positive. She decided, on a lark, to put a duck on someones car as a way to brighten a stranger’s day. It did. It got posted. It went viral. The Jeepers grabbed on to it and it has remained a thing.
Not long after I wrote my article my friend Benjamin, who lives in Australia, sent me an Australian duck with a baby in its front pouch (see the picture above). Then within a few days, ducks began to show up on my truck. First one, then another joined my little flock. Occasionally one would arrive at my door. Then at a Plaza Fellowship one night, people began to hand me ducks telling me that had been asked to deliver them to me. Now about two dozen fly with me.
At the Christmas Eve service, Viola handed me a tiny little duck. She told me that there was a big flock of people who were in my flock and on my team. The ducks were just a way to encourage me and my work. She told me, “When you are about to quack up, remember us.” (well she did not say it that way exactly, but I could not pass up the pun). As we head to a new year, it’s important to remember that we need each other.
One of our Scripture memory verses seem to fit the occasion exactly, “And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching” (Hebrews 10:24-25). Thanks to all those that encourage me and thanks especially to Benjamin and Viola for my ducks.