I wasn’t expecting a baby toy to make me stop and think about so much of my life.
But there I was, holding a stuffed mallard duck in a store, reading its name: Maverick the Mallard.
That was enough.
After I lost my dad, I listened to a lot of Garth Brooks. Sometimes you find music that gives you somewhere to put what you’re feeling, especially when you don’t know how to explain it. You play it again because something in it connects. Then again because that connection is still there.
“Against the Grain” was one of those songs for me.
Its opening reference to being a maverick stuck with me, along with the idea that making a difference sometimes means being willing to stand apart. You have to decide what matters enough to speak up about, even when going along would be easier.
I heard that song during a hard chapter of my life. Its message stayed with me long after.
Years later, there was another search happening in a completely different chapter: I wanted to find a mallard duck toy for my children.
With a last name like Malliard, it seemed like something they ought to have. A small, silly connection to our name. Something they could hold, play with, and perhaps someday remember.
I spent years looking while they were little.
Now my children are grown, and suddenly I’m standing in a store holding exactly the kind of toy I had wanted to find back then. And of all the names it could have, this one is called Maverick.
I thought about my dad. I thought about the music I played after losing him. I thought about my kids when they were small and how much life has happened since those days.
There are things you expect to bring memories back. An old photograph. A familiar place. A song coming through the speakers.
A tag hanging from a baby toy caught me by surprise.
Lately, I’ve been learning how close different chapters of life can feel to one another. Losing Tabby has brought its own grief, but it has also made me think about earlier losses and the years we spent building our family. Memories don’t arrive in order. One small thing can take you through several decades before you’ve even put it back on the shelf.
And that song still means something to me.
I’ve never been especially good at staying quiet about things I care about. Sometimes that makes life complicated. Sometimes I question myself. There are days when I wonder whether the work, the words, or the effort are reaching anyone.
But I keep coming back to the importance of listening to your heart and having the courage to act on it. I heard that in a song years ago. I’m still trying to live it now.
I don’t need to explain the moment as anything more than what it was. I found a little duck with a familiar name, and it brought a lot back.
For a few minutes, I remembered being a son missing his dad and a father searching for something for his young children.
Both are still part of me.
And apparently, both can show up while I’m standing in a store holding Maverick the Mallard.