We no longer go to the old farmhouse for holidays—it is too
much for my mother and has been for several years. I hosted our immediate family
again for Thanksgiving this year, our first major holiday since my dad’s death,
and my tears brined our turkey.
I was doing well: setting the tables, preparing the meal, enjoying
our home filled with our children and grandchildren, but then I stepped on the
cat’s tail, she howled, and I cried.
This grief jumps from around corners and invades the quiet moments of my life. It startles me, catching me without my security system set securely around my heart. Like today—the first delicious snow day of the school year. This gift of eight hours of unscheduled time smiles at me.
The house is mine.
The day is mine.
I sit with my coffee, admiring the beautiful, wet snow smothering
the bird feeders, flocking the pines, blanketing the lawn, and I miss my dad.
“Our rooster
is havin’ a really great year,” my seven-year-old granddaughter shares late
last summer as we weed her herb garden. Her twin brother Caleb is having a
playdate with a friend, so we are enjoying some rare one-on-one time together. She
converses with me in that delightful way young children do with people they
know and trust—completely, openly, sincerely—and she clearly has opinions about
their current rooster and his quality of life.
Hmmm.
What constitutes a good year for a rooster?
All his ladies at his disposal?
I love this picture: Chloe, our little goat girl.
A crowd to admire his strut and swag?
We had
several chickens who wandered the farm of my childhood. When I was seven, we
had a rooster with these feathery bangs we named “Ringo.” The Beatles had just
begun their U.S. tour, and my brother and I found the Fab Four’s hairdos both
hilarious and amazing. When Ed Sullivan featured the Beatles in 1964, I watched,
laughed and danced, shaking my head and playing an air guitar before there was
a name for such things. Our rooster
Ringo was king of the barn and certainly wouldn’t have eaten from my hand no matter
how patiently and persistently I would have tried. A “great year” for Ringo
would have included lots of bugs and corn to eat, as he led the simple life of
an under-appreciated bachelor.
Chloe’s
rooster doesn’t really have a name. Just “Rooster.” He has free range of
everything on their little ten-acre homestead: the woods, the yard, the
driveway, even the garage. He has a selection of twelve fine-looking hens—well
muscled and productive—and he is ever-vigilant, crowing if concerned by a
sudden change or separation of his brood.
So what makes “Rooster” and his year
so good?
“Well, Nana,
he just knows that brother and I are gentle and kind. Our other rooster didn’t
know that. But this rooster doesn’t chase us, so we reward him.”
Hmmm.
How do you reward a rooster?
A trip to the neighbor’s coop for
a little tryst?
A new perch from which to announce
the sunrise?
“So Nana,
sometimes when I’m pickin’ berries, I save some an’ he comes to me and eats
outta my hand,” she continues.
Wow. Really?
“I’ll show
you.” She confidently marches to the nearby blueberry bushes, picks a tiny
handful, and crouches low to the ground. She quietly calls to Rooster.
“It’s okay. You’re a good boy. Come here…I have blueberries for you.” She holds her little cupped hands still and continues to talk softly… gently… and sure enough, Rooster slowly approaches her and picks the berries carefully from her hand. He doesn’t hurt her or peck at her when the berries are gone. He simply cocks his head one when and then the other, then scoots off to scratch for bugs near the raspberry canes. Chloe brushes off her hands, stands, and turns to me, proud and satisfied.
Chloe rewarding Rooster.
Here’s what I know: our amazing world
will be at this child’s command.
My
seven-year-old granddaughter has learned the benefits of giving positive
rewards at an early age. Although she doesn’t fully understand the psychology,
Chloe is discovering how certain actions can maintain or change a behavior. What
power she will have.
My daughter and son-in-law are very involved and committed to their family, but as all parents, they are blissfully oblivious to the tests awaiting them and the quickly developing sophistication of this tiny, expressive redhead.
While Rooster’s
time on this earth has come to an end, our dear Chloe’s journey has just begun.
