What Are You Waiting For?

Once upon a time, there was a farmer who, among other things, raised chickens. One day, as he was out on his tractor, he passed by a small pond. Next to the water he found the scattered remains of a female duck (apparently killed by a fox) and a nest of eggs that the fox had somehow missed. He carefully scooped up the eggs, carried them back to the barn, and placed them in the nest of a hen. The trick worked! The old mother hen somehow got the idea that the eggs were hers. As maternal instinct kicked in, she sat on the eggs, just as she always did, until they finally hatched.
The ducklings never knew the difference. They assumed the old hen was their mother and followed her around the barnyard just the way baby chicks would usually do. The rest of the chickens didn't know the difference either. They readily accepted the baby ducklings as members of the family.
One day, a summer rainstorm had left a huge puddle of water in the barnyard. The chickens carefully picked their way around the edges of the water. But without even thinking about it, the ducklings just waddled over and started paddling around. The mother hen was greatly alarmed. "Get out of there this instant!" she frantically cried. "You can't do that! You're chickens! You'll drown!" Reluctantly, the ducklings left the puddle. The water had felt so good in the hot sun.
But the puddle incident was only the beginning of the duckling's confusion. They did their best to blend into the surrounding chicken culture, but they continued to suffer embarrassing lapses. Sometimes when they tried to cluck, they quacked instead. Sometimes when they got excited, they would flap their wings and start to fly -- until they remembered that they were chickens, and chickens didn't do that. Their embarrassment slowly grew into frustration and finally deepened into depression. Something wasn't right, and they couldn't figure out what it was.
One night, a wise owl sitting in a nearby tree saw the ducklings and said, "Whooooo... are you?" "Chickens," they replied sheepishly. They were ashamed to admit it. They knew they were not very good representatives of the chicken community.
"Don't be ridiculous, " the owl replied. "You are not chickens. You're not made to cluck and scratch the ground. Haven't you ever felt like swimming across a pond? Haven't you ever felt like spreading your wings and flying away?"
"Yes!" they replied. "Yes, we've felt that way many times. But we were always told that we couldn't. We were always told that we weren't supposed to."
"Horsefeathers!" cried the owl in disbelief.
The ducklings looked around excitedly among themselves.
"Well,' the owl finally asked, "what are you waiting for?"


- as told by Mark Ng