Staying in Your Lane

Last year an acquaintance of ours offered to give us a rooster.  The rooster was purchased from a feed store as a baby chick and was supposed to be a laying hen.  However, as the chick grew and matured, it was discovered that the hen was not a hen - it was a rooster!  Roosters don't lay eggs and this person lived in town and didn't want a crowing rooster to wake up the neighborhood.  We gladly accepted the rescue rooster onto our homestead. 

He has grown into a regal-looking gentleman.  Most times that a new bird is introduced into a flock and its already established pecking order, they are ostracized, picked on, and bullied.  Sometimes this mistreatment ends in death.  Not in this case.  The old boy had lots of confidence from day 1, proudly patrolling the barnyard, putting the other roosters on notice and catching the eye of his new harem of hens.

Right before the sun rises, the rooster's crows reverberate around the country-side, alerting slumbering neighbors of the dawn of a new day.  The rooster struts around, keeping his hens in line.  He is the cock of the walk.  One afternoon last week I saw him standing on top of the garden fence and felt trouble was brewing.  I don't want the old boy in the garden, scratching in the mulch and eating our produce.  We once had a chicken that would sneak into the garden and eat the bottoms out of our homegrown tomatoes.  We put a fast end to that.

Saturday afternoon, the fence-sitting progressed to trespassing.  I cornered the curious cock and took swift action.  The bird is big and put up a fight.  His wingspan was quite impressive.

'Twas that impressive wingspan that enabled the old fellow to fly up to the top of the garden gate and then hop down into the garden.  This rooster needs to learn to stay in his lane.  We drew a 'red line in the sand.'

Before

You may be thinking that we killed the rooster, but that's not at all what we did.  I got some scissors to clip his wings.  By clipping his wings, he would no longer be able to fly to the top of the garden gate.  Snip-Snip, here.  Snip-Snip, there, and the job was quickly done!

After

Without those feathers, he would not be able to get in trouble by trespassing into the garden.  His wings were literally clipped.

Like the rooster, we can all step out of our boundaries from time to time.  A little encouragement to help us stay in our lane is much appreciated.  The old fellow's wings will eventually grow back and we will have to clip wings again, but for now, he is grounded, and he is in a "fowl" mood because of it.

I Am A Pie Guy

I leave the house each morning about 5:30 am and drive approximately 42 minutes to work.  While driving, I enjoy a thermos of coffee, sweetened slightly by a half teaspoon of local honey with pour of heavy cream from our cows.  I was about 20 minutes into my trip and had finished about half of the coffee.  I reached over and took a sip of coffee, but something was odd.  There was something solid in my mouth.  Coffee is supposed to be liquid.  I spit the solid substance into my hand and turned on the light.  It looked like a raisin.  Who put a raisin in my coffee? 

Wait a minute!  That's not a raisin.  It's a FLY!!!  I spit it out and sat there driving.  Should I pour the rest of the coffee out?  The coffee that has been marinating in fly juice?  Nah, I just finished it and tried real hard not to think about it.  It took every bit of concentration I could muster.  Let's think about more pleasant thoughts, shall we?

Since the land has been purchased across the road and plowed, our dewberry patch is gone.  We found some growing in the back and picked three quarts, and that's not bad.  It's just not the 3 gallons we used to pick.  Our thornless blackberries are growing nicely, but with two bushes, we primarily pick them just to eat one by one. 

One evening a friend dropped by with a bucket of berries he had picked from his blackberry patch and wanted to give them to us!  What a blessing!!  Big, plump, sweet blackberries...

You'll never see my turn down dessert.  I have a sweet tooth, so I like all types of sweets.  I think my favorite, though, is homemade pie.  Coconut cream with a tall meringue, pecan, apple, peach, chocolate.  I've not found a pie that I didn't like, although I heard in England they serve a kidney pie.  I don't think that sounds good.

Anyway, Tricia decided to make a blackberry pie with our bucket of berries.  She made up a homemade crust, added flour, berries, and butter...

It wasn't long before it was ready to come out of the oven.

I attempted and failed to get a slice of pie without it falling apart. 

A slice of homemade pie and a cup of coffee (minus the fly).  One of life's simple pleasures.

Stretch Out Your Wings and Fly!

Yesterday I was in a large home improvement store for a meeting and I looked up and saw a male cardinal flying around frantically in the store.  The poor fellow undoubtedly flew in when one of the doors opened and now was hopelessly trapped, flying from aisle to aisle looking for a way out.  That's how I feel when I have to go shopping, too, except I can find my way out through the exit.  I don't know if the cardinal found his way out.

Last Sunday when we drove back into the garage from church, there was a bird in our garage.  With two large overhead doors, you'd think he'd be able to find his way out.  He couldn't.  He was fooled by those darned windows!  He kept flying into one and Benjamin and I went and scooped him up.  He was just fine.

It was a little dove - certainly a cute little guy. Just like the cardinal in the big box store, he was trapped and just needed a little help - help we were glad to give him. We admired him for a bit.  I think he is a mourning dove.  In the mornings or late afternoons, you can hear them with their haunting sounds.  This little dove was in mourning after running into the window in the garage numerous times.  He's okay now, though.  Benjamin took him out of the garage and gave him a gentle toss and he was up, up, and away...

He flew up into the pear tree...  And a partridge mourning dove in a pear tree...  And then he was gone.  Unlike the cardinal trapped in the store, this guy had his freedom.  He stretched out his wings and flew away and never looked back.

It reminded me of Noah and the dove he sent out that never came back.

Genesis 8:8-12 James Version (KJV)

8 Also he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the ground;

9 But the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into the ark, for the waters were on the face of the whole earth: then he put forth his hand, and took her, and pulled her in unto him into the ark.

10 And he stayed yet other seven days; and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark;

11 And the dove came in to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off: so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth.

12 And he stayed yet other seven days; and sent forth the dove; which returned not again unto him any more.

Maybe there's a morale in the story about the cardinal and the mourning dove. There's life to be lived out there - life outside of the big box stores and cramped garages and even arks.  Freedom! Why, there are blue skies, fresh air, and trees adorned with leaves.  Sometimes you need a little help.  Sometimes you just need to stretch your wings out and fly.