Chickens.

Such a farm word. You picture a farm, and invariably you will have automatically placed chickens in the picture. Along with a cow or two. Some hay, a tractor and maybe even a small pond. But that is where it ends. You do not picture the chickens playing any sort of important role in the farm. They are more of an accessory. We have several chicken stories, but I think I will start out with one of the most bizarre.

We have chickens. We have had many odd chickens. We are currently down to 2 big golden retriever colored roosters, and 2 black, white, irridescent bantam roosters that have feathers on their feet. My son, Chris, works at Hardee's. One night he returns from Hardee's and actually enters the house and sits with my other son, Jon, and myself in the family room. This is odd in itself since Chris is usually pasted in front of the computer playing some involved virtual life video game.

I look over at him. He says, "I think I took a chicken to work with me."

Silence.

Jon says, "All of our chickens are here, Chris. You didn't take a chicken to work with you." (At this time we may have had 6 - 8 chickens waiting to be coyote bait...ha.)

Chris shakes his head. "No, I took a chicken to work with me."

Now, I am sitting there trying to even formulate what he is alluding to. Could it be possible that a chicken held onto the car for 15 miles, reaching speeds of I am sure over the speed limit of 55, survived several passings of cars (and no one honked to let him know there was a chicken attached to his car?) and then waited for Chris to finish working his 5 hours, hopped back onto the car (front? back? underneath?) and rode home because inside the chicken was truly a daredevil soul?

"Chris, what do you mean you took a chicken to work with you?"

Silence.

"Well, mom, this lady comes in and says that there is this chicken outside in the parking lot hanging around a green car. So I go outside, and sure enough, there is this small chicken hanging around our green car. So I go and pick it up and put it inside on the back seat. I finish my shift and come home."

Wow. First off, we have all of our chickens here. They are conveniently roosting on our front porch. Second, what are the odds of a chicken being in Hardee's parking lot, choosing a car of a person that doesn't know what all of his family's chickens look like, so he assumes it is one of his, and getting a ride to a new home?

Jon asks, "So where is the chicken now?"

Chris shrugs as if he wasn't sure he wanted to be part of this oddity. "I took him out of the car when I got home. He is probably still by the car."

Jon grabs a flashlight. We go outside. Sure enough, there is a small chicken sitting on the hood of the car, all huddled down for a good night's sleep. Jon approaches slowly. We examine it from a distance of maybe a foot.

"Do you think I can touch it?" Jon inquires.

"Shoot, I don't know. Sure, go ahead. I will be ready to bean it with the flashlight if it attacks you." I offer quite confident of my flashlight beating skills.

Jon slowly reaches out and touches the chicken. The chicken looks up, non-plussed. Jon begins to pet its back. The chicken is still ok with this. Jon then picks the chicken up with both hands. "Quick, open the basement door!"

I trot ahead and open the basement door. Jon enters with chicken in hand. He finds his way through the maze of junk I have collected (another story in itself) and plops this chicken next to where Chris is now sitting, glued to the computer screen, playing a game. Jon announces that this is now his (Chris's) responsibility.

Chris just stares. Jon and I retreat back upstairs.

How totally bizarre. Jon has noted in the brief time he held the chicken that it is a rooster, a bantam (small breed of chicken) with long silken feathers. Almost like a show rooster. It has longer claw dillies on the back of the legs so that indicates that it is an older rooster. Where it came from, we have no idea. It is almost like the coke bottle in the movie, "The Gods Must Be Crazy" and we are the aborigines that get this "gift" from the gods.

4 am. I hear the chicken crowing in the basement. Chris of course has just left it there. "Good," I thought, "he deserves to be wakened by it. He should have put it outside with the others."