Webster's defines identity as, "sameness of essential or generic character in different instances; or oneness." But what makes us who we are?
             As we walked into Hubbard Park, as we did every Sunday, my father would ask, "Do you think they know we're coming?" Of course he was asking about the Mallards that used the pond as their summer home. It was a little running joke my father and I had, as we would sneak like spies from tree to tree, to the lake to see how close we could get without our little friends noticing us.
             In the fairly small-at that time-little Connecticut town I lived in until I was seven, you would know summer was right on your heel when you heard the Mallards sounding off their rank and file flying in from wherever they migrated to all winter. They had become dependant on the grain Mr. & Mrs. Warring, the nice old couple who used to live on the lake, would feed them. Mr. Warring passed away during the winter of '75 and his widow moved away to live with her son and his family. My father told me it was our responsibility to make sure they were fat and healthy for their trip home, he promised Mrs. Warring he would do his best to help the ducks after she left. When I said the couple wouldn't know if we really went or not, my father was quick to let me know that in the end, when all else is gone, a man is only as good as his word. "You can lie to others but you can never lie to yourself," is something I heard many times as a child.
             This is the first clear memory I have of my formidable years and the first of many lessons I would learn from my father. I still think it was the most important.
             When I was about six years old, my brother and I got our first job. We got paid one dollar for every wheelbarrow full of rocks we picked out of the neighbor/landlord's garden. Now I know when most people think of a garden they picture a nice little ten by twenty-fou...