|
The
goose that had the cameo appearance in the movie was named Flick. He came to
me as an egg from a guy who still used geese in his small cotton field to
help control weeds. Flick was named so because he was born afflicted. His
head was turned nearly upside down and his neck was so crooked that he had
to have been seeing the world from a totally different angle than the rest
of us. He’d start grazing in our yard and make big circles until he made
it two houses down, then he’d circle back. Unlike other geese, he never
bit anybody. As a matter of fact, he was so gentle that he’d sit in my lap
to have his back scratched.
At
different times we had King pigeons, Lahore pigeons, Giant Runt pigeons,
various doves, pheasants, ducks and all sorts of chickens. Where I’m from,
lots of people had birds. Some folks kept them for a source of protein, some
had fancy birds for their aesthetic value and others kept them for
entertainment.
A
friend and I went over to an adjoining county to see a man about buying some
banties we’d seen advertised in the Farm Bulletin. When we got there, we
found the large yard surrounding his home scattered with little A-frame
shelters made of corrugated metal roofing. To each shelter was tethered a
rooster. I’d seen such places as I rode through the countryside, but I’d
never been that close. They were absolutely some of the most gorgeous
animals I have ever seen. He had Whitehackles, Sweaters, Hatches and a Kelso
or two, but the one that impressed me most was the Roundhead breed. Huge
chests, bright golden eyes, black saddle feathers that nearly drug the
ground and iridescent red everywhere else that glimmered even in the shade
of the big pecan trees they were under.
I
forgot all about the banties and inquired as to the cost of one of the big
birds. He went into a tale of how he shipped roosters to the Philippines,
Indonesia and Ireland. Just from his hem hawing around, I knew I couldn’t
afford one of his birds. He asked me what I planned to do with the rooster.
I went into my own tale about going to the state zoo after finding out about
a chicken give-a-way and chasing some half Ceylon Jungle Fowl down. I hoped
to breed him with some of the hens I nabbed. He told me he had just the
bird.
In
a pen on his porch was a hunkered down rooster who acted like he was afraid
of his own shadow. The man explained to us that Pepper (the bird’s name)
had cowered in a fight and, because he was so pretty, instead of destroying
him, he brought him home. He told me that he would probably always be
"chicken" after the butt whooping he’d gotten at that last fight
but that he might have enough spunk in him to make a chick or two. Two days
later I let Pepper into my yard for the first time. Within 30 minutes he was
getting gang beaten by three banties that could have used him for shade. He
never would fight back…just learned to use those long legs to run.
Our
bantam chickens ran free, foraging over our yard and the neighbors’. They
were part of the landscape. Every morning they’d get a coffee can full of
chops and scraps from our supper the night before. Pops grew enough tomato
plants to feed us, half the town and the chickens. We ate their eggs, when
we could find a nest, and the next door neighbor lady occasionally killed an
extra young rooster to be smothered in dumplings.
Why
did the chicken cross the road? At one time, it was probably running from my
Aunt Nan. Aunt Nan hated our chickens. She lived on the other side of our
house from our neighbor and my grandmother lived just beyond her. Every day
we’d hear her screaming "Shoo! Shoo!" and then mumble something
as she looked angrily toward our house.
My
father hoed around his garden plants, my aunt used ground leaves as mulch
around her flowers. Our chickens would scratch poor Aunt Nan’s mulch
everywhere but where she wanted it. They also pooped on her porch, in her
porch swing and on her car. Aunt Nan was a rotund woman who, unless she was
going to town to shop or to attend mass, wore what some people call a duster
or what we called a muu muu. For those of you not familiar with a muu muu,
it’s a loose fitting cotton dress with colorful patterns that hangs just
below the knee…made for the full figured girl, if you know what I mean.
We
had a hailstorm one summer day and one of our hens got her neck broken. Aunt
Nan brought a glass of iced tea to her front porch, sat down in an aluminum
folding chair and watched my chicken flop around for 15 minutes until it
stopped moving. She hated them that bad.
My
brother and I would hide and watch her chase our banties with her broom then
watch them chase her when they’d had enough. Once I felt really bad when a
little Golden Seabright rooster snuck up behind her while she was hanging
out clothes and spurred her in the back of the calf. It’s hard to teach an
animal with a brain the size of a small acorn right from wrong.
I
grudgingly gave the rooster to a buddy of mine to avoid a repeat attack. She
was one of my favorite relatives of all time, but that day, I would have
rather given him Aunt Nan.
Disclaimer:
The story you just read is based on reality. The names have been changed to
protect the innocent. Any likeness any character in this story has to you, your family or anybody you know or have known is completely coincidental.
|
