Chickens

I never thought that chickens would be a part of my life. My childhood experience with them was fraught with difficulties.

Our oldest brother gave my sister and me two dyed chicks for Easter. The dye must have affected their tiny brains. They were the meanest animals I have ever known. They would rush at us, trying to peck our legs.

No tears were shed when they were Sunday dinner.

Many years later I meet my Sweetie who had “the girls” as he called his chickens. When he returned home at the end of the day, he could hear them clucking hello. He treated them to worms from the garden since they could not range freely in the desert grassland in Arizona. He introduced me to real eggs from free range chickens. With their dark yellow yokes that stand proudly above the whites, they are much more flavorful that those from egg factories.

Now more than a decade later my oldest daughter has backyard chickens in a small town in Massachusetts. All of hers have names and she cradles them in her arms.

I remember my mother talking wistfully about the Rhode Island Reds her grandmother raised.

So what is it about chickens that captures the hearts of people?