Excerpt from my biography~ The Wonder Years: Junior High~ Coolest Pet

I HAD THE COOLEST PET IN THE WORLD

His name was Doc. Doctor Waggletail Szeker to be precise...a mallard full of spunk. My cat, Bootsie, was actually pretty spectacular too...but Doc was a wonder. He loved me, played with me, trusted me, and protected me. I raised him from a chick and he knew I was mommy...he also knew that my sisters weren't mommy; nor were they daddy. They were beings that needed to be put into place when mommy was near. Heck, even when mommy wasn't near. He really liked ankles though...you did not want to go barefoot when Doc was by your toes. Many a time my sisters would come shrieking into the house with blood blisters forming on their lovely heels.

Yep. I had Doc pretty well trained.

I would dive into our pool and he would jump in and dive right after me. His trust of me was so great that I could lull him into laying on his back in the swimming pool. Yes, even on a raft.

Back then I was even stupider than I am now. I, and my sisters, lived to 'lay out'...mind you, this was before we had any knowledge of skin cancer. We would laugh at sunblock. No, we wanted the baby oil for the skin and the lemons for the hair thank you very much. We had these metal lounge chairs with rubber band thingies for padding where you could bend the heads and feet areas to go up and down according to how you wished to bake yourself. I could float on the raft because Doc would just play with me...but my sisters had to use the chairs. If they felt really brave they would bend the feet to hang over the water. Doc would quack and swim around me until he saw that my sisters were comfortable and feeling safe...then he would attack. He'd do this low soft quaking like he was talking to his spy network..."mmrrrmrrr mrr mrr? mrrrrmmmmr..." Then it would get loud and fast..."MRR! MRRR MRR! MAMERRRR!!!" And he would slide his beak up a non-suspecting fool of a foot and spray water all over the relaxed leg. It never failed. A scream would issue from the being on the chair followed by something like, "Mimi! Control your duck!" or "I hate him! I absolutely HATE HIM!" Doc would chuckle to himself, "Mawmarrr! MA MA MA MA MRRRR!" and whichever one of my sisters that was attacked (usually Karen, oddly enough) would raise their chair leg back up or go inside the house. Job completed, Doc would then swim around me or dive under me and swim around the pool to resurface with a flap flap of the wings and a great waggle of the tail.

God, how I loved that duck.