To some, it would be easily described as a chore.  But the mere connotation of something obligatory, and worse yet, something dreaded is so far from my experience that I can only call it a chore in jest.  I stop by the coop with a breakfast of oats and mealworms for the girls.  It’s yet too early for the automatic door to have opened, but as I talk with the girls from outside the coop, I hear them jump off the roosting bars and even peck at the door.  Knowing the eager parade of feathered excitement that awaits, I happily open the door myself, and chuckle at the onslaught of chatter and energy from seven crazy chickens.  The oats and mealworms are greatly appreciated and quickly devoured.  I open the window on the coop from inside the run before making my departure to go around to the coop and the remaining windows. 

When I step inside the coop, Della comes in from the chicken door.  Abandoning the oats and mealworms is no small deal, and I know even more certainly that I have in the past few days that she is getting close to laying her first egg.  She jumps up on the small step stool I have in front of the nesting boxes and begins her quiet cooing.  It delights my soul in ways I cannot describe.  I know it makes me sound truly crazy, but it truly feels like a sweet conversation.  I give her a little pep talk and she hops up into the nesting boxes.  She’s done this before, but today she settles in more than previously and I know for certain today there will be an egg.  There is something very serene about a hen in a nest.  They are so quiet and still I often think they might be praying.  I relate more than I care to admit; enjoying my own solitude and quiet whenever I can and understanding the satisfaction that comes from doing even just one thing well. 

I have to leave for work before I see the results of her efforts.  But I carry this little moment, this simple peace, with me throughout my day.  

They say God speaks to us.  If only we are still enough to listen.  I hear Him.  His creation speaks to me.  In the soft cooing reassurances of a bird, I hear Him say, “Be.Here.Now.”  And I stand, in the coop, with Della and my Lord as company.  It is well with my soul. 

We’ve known Ruby was giving serious thought to laying her first egg a couple weeks ago.  She went into the coop and cackled and fretted about.  Soon, we thought.  Soon.

But waiting on your first chicken to lay her first egg is a lot like the proverbial water pot. 

But this morning, I went out to spend some time with the girls.  I took out some oats and meal worms, a favorite breakfast of the flock.  Ruby had her share but then wandered off into the coop on her own again.  I heard her make some soft coo’s, but then she’d come right back out.  She jumped up on the bale of straw we have in the coop and started scratching around on it.  I thought we might be nearer the egg-laying event than we had been, so I went over to gently discourage her from using the straw bale as nesting grounds.  Ruby jumped off as I approached, but then came right up by me once I sat down.  Ruby is friendly, but not usually in a sit-right-next-to-you kind of a way, especially if you don’t have treats with you. 

I smoothed her feathers and talked to her a bit, but when she snuck in behind my back, between me and the wall and started scratching the straw bale again, I knew she was really getting serious.  I went out the chicken run and into the coop (I have to go out and around, chickies have their own little door).  I called to the chickens and sure enough, the whole flock comes into the coop to see what’s going on.  Ruby came right to me and I gently picked her up and put her in the nesting box.  She immediately took to it and started scratching around, nesting.  I was elated!!

As she scratched and futzed and got herself settled, the rest of the flock took it as their cue to leave and headed back into the run.  While Ruby rearranged the wood chips to her liking and settled and resettled herself, the girls took turns peeking in the chicken door to see if everything was okay.  Della even “tiptoed” in and across the floor of the coop to check on Ruby!  April was bold enough to get right up to the nesting box to see what was going on in there. 

Ruby just sat.

Every now and then she would emit a soft cluck, but otherwise, she just sat and quietly moved wood chips with her beak to make the perfect nest.

After a half hour or so of this, she stood up and began to cluck VERY LOUDLY.  I thought she was announcing to the world that she had just laid her first egg, but I’ll admit, I hadn’t seen anything that made me think an egg had actually been laid.  Her clucking was very entertaining but what I loved most were the response clucks from the girls in the run.  It was like a support group of girlfriends!!  “Way to go, Ruby!” you could almost hear them saying.  (Or at least that’s what I heard, but I am a crazy chicken lady.) 

After a few minutes of crazy clucking, Ruby hopped off the nesting box, pecked around at the floor of the coop and then went out into the run.

Only when she was out did I peek into the nesting box. 

NO EGG.  Nothing.  Nada. 

I went to the window and looked out into the run.  Ruby was wandering around, stopping to peck at the pieces of asparagus the flock had abandoned from last night’s snack.  She got a drink of water and then, right in the middle of the run, she squatted down and popped out an egg!

I RAN out the coop, into the run and snatched up the egg just as four other chickens were descending upon it, Della ready to give it a good peck.  The egg was perfect.  It wasn’t soft shelled, which I had been expecting for a first egg! 

I guess Ruby just wanted me to GET OUT OF THE COOP so she could lay her egg in peace.  I hope tomorrow, or whenever she lays again, she will stay in the nesting box for the duration of the process!!  And if I happen to be out there, I promise to stay in the run and just watch from the window.  Unless it’s a whole ‘nother chicken.  I can’t make promises if it’s someone else’s first egg!

She snitched one from the bowl, but then couldn’t figure out how to eat it.

Chickens have been on the radar for a few years.  With enough confidence that we made our farm logo and sign with chickens right on it.  Pretty brave for people who change their mind a lot.  I also carried around with me a picture of a coop that was to be the inspiration for the one we would build.  When our trip to Cabo got canceled this year, we decided to take “vacation” funds and turn them into “chick mansion” funds and we got to work.

Bear drew up the plans for the coop.  How he took my ramblings and “I think I want’s” into an actual architectural drawing, I’ll never know how, but he did!  (My original “sketch” was “chicken scratch” indeed!) We had the same man who built our barn frame up the coop (we can at least recognize that measurements that matter aren’t our specialty; we are more of “yup, it looks level!” kinds of folks!)

We spent quarantine time finishing the rest of the coop up, which for me meant decorating and landscaping and for Chief, it meant digging, fencing, swearing and making the place as raccoon proof as possible.

We did all this with a deadline.  In order to get the breeds I wanted, I had to get my day-old chicks in early March.  The bigger they grew, the more the brooder stopped being a good abode, and the faster we worked to finish off the coop.  The quarantine didn’t help.  We had stocked up on all the materials we thought we needed ahead of the closures, but you know how projects go and so we had to make do in some cases or go without in others to get it done while stores were closed or limited.

All that said, in May, the girls moved into the new home.  Within the next couple weeks, they could use their run as well.  And by the end of June, we realized we didn’t have eight girls; one cockerel had slipped past the gender inspections at the breeder and we now have our hands on a rooster-wanna-be.  Sigh.

The Crazy Eight keep me very entertained.  I visit at least twice a day and by visit, I do mean there’s usually conversation and snacks.  Well, I converse; they snack.  It’s a good deal both ways.

Been awhile.  Forgive me.

At my kitchen counter this morning, I hear the dryer murmuring as it tumbles sheets, warm and bleach smelling.  Birds sing in the sun and shadows outside the open windows.  Leaves dance in a sweet summer breeze.  I can see the cows, savoring their morning siestas under the pines.  Mabel, having just turned one last week, finding her own cool spot; ears flicking the flies away.

Herbs are drying in front of the dining room windows.  Won’t be long until the oregano is dry enough to grind.  As the breeze flows in against the basil and parsley I am tempted to make a pot of sauce.  Flowers on the counter, fresh cut from the garden just yesterday where I picked beans and tomatoes and a couple cucumbers.  Most of the tomatoes don’t make the trip to the house but are eaten while weeding; a reward for the effort.

I hear the rooster crow, proclaiming his territory to all the world.  We are eager, and yet not, for him to find a new home.

A pair of orioles stop by the feeder out back.  We still have enough jelly in the cabinet to keep them coming at least until the grapes are ready in the fall.

Charlotte calls from the porch.  After a night of hunting, she is ready to come in for love and a comfy nap spot.  A lap will do just fine for her.  Trudy comes to check her out, smelling her to make sure she is the same cat that left early this morning.  Trudy too, welcomes some love and would love a nap on a lap.  If only she were small enough.

It is July, the month between school ending and beginning yet again.  My days are filled only as I want them to be.  Chores rarely feel as such; even weeding takes on a cathartic tone this time of year, giving me a quiet, calm sense of accomplishment I seldom feel in the classroom.  I spend too much time with the chickens these days.  My “crazy eight” make me laugh, make me marvel and make me breathe.  Slowly.

To sit and shell peas or snap beans in the yard, surrounded by a flock of feathered supervisors, listening to chicken chatter is as close to heaven as July can bring.  I am sure of it.

Days like today are a gift.  I know that. I relish that.  But every cherishable moment I have in July isn’t because of the profession I chose, or the money I have saved, or the town I live in.  Every thing that brings me joy, that fills these moments are because of the man I married.  Our home, our farm, our creatures, our comforts, our whole life is joyful because we are together.  Sitting on the porch is wonderful, but when The Mister is next to me, it is serene.  It is cathartic.  It is healing.

Yesterday, I was sitting with my “girls,” taking pictures of the birds and being otherwise completely unproductive.  The Mister sat with me for a while, but then went to the barn to check on this or that, stopped by the neighbors to talk about a thing and returned back to find I hadn’t moved; my to-do list remained undone.  He wandered off from where I was sitting and I watched him, trying to figure out what he was thinking, what item on his list he was itching to scratch off.  He kicked the ground a few times, scuffing the dirt.  He looked around, seemingly deep in thought.  He walked past the tree line and into the leaves and scrub and looked around and eventually bent down to pick something up.

A worm.  He had gone off to find a worm simply to feed to the chickens.  My man.  My man.

He wondered aloud the other day what his “legacy” might be when he leaves this earth.  It was on his mind, bothering his heart and he presented it to me as a concern with heavy weight.  Later, he quietly said, “Maybe, if people just wished for reincarnation, hoping they might return as one of the animals I cared for…that would be enough.”

I can tell you, as someone he cares for, that is not just enough.  It is everything.

It’s been over thirty years since I sat in her classroom.  The class most high schoolers dreaded the most – speech class – was my favorite and I was always eager to get to Mrs. Aavang’s room.  Even after so much time, I can still remember vividly performing “The Jaberwocky” (I can even recite some of it by heart.)  I remember parliamentary procedure, how to spell ‘Shakespeare’, and that I once wrote over a dozen drafts of a business letter only to miss a point because I forgot to sign my name.  I also remember a speech I gave as a radio broadcast from the Garden of Eden.  I remember the day we all came into class and she had a pink paper on her desk.  We asked her what it was for and she said, “I told you I’d tell you when I knew.”  It took us most of the class period, but we finally figured out it meant she was pregnant with a girl.  Most of all, however, I remember how she made me feel.  I knew I was good at giving speeches because she showed me I was.  I knew I had a love for it as well because she let me have fun with it and to be myself in whatever form that took for me at sixteen years old.  She made me feel successful and powerful and creative and smart.  I wanted to diagram more sentences, learn more poetry, write more stories and give speeches as often as she’d allow it. 

A week ago, my own fourth graders held their first “Sharing Day”.  While this was routine in my second grade class, it took extra hours of thinking and planning to adapt this familiar practice to fourth grade curriculum and students.  We decided to share our “How-To” writings, and to make it more entertaining, we invited parents and grandparents as unsuspecting guinea pigs to actually perform the “how-to’s” while each student read them.  We didn’t get nearly the same number of parents that a second grade show brings, but we welcomed those that did come and we applauded them for enduring several demonstrations on slime, paper mache, and board games.  But somewhere in the middle of the presentations, when I was standing at the back of my classroom taking pictures and laughing with my students I had a flashback to my days in Mrs. Aavang’s class.  She once told me, “I used to just put an A on your score sheet, sit back and watch you go, knowing you’d be great.” That’s what I felt like watching my kids.  No, they weren’t all “great”, but they were all brave and creative and successful in their own right.  And I was beaming with pride on their behalf. 

They say students may forget what you teach them, but they will never forget how you made them feel.  I know this.  I know it like I know I need air to breathe.  Mrs. Aavang taught me that.  Even after thirty years or more, she continues to be my teaching mentor.  Her example will always remind me of what excellence in teaching is. 

My counter, as Christmas break begins, is full of “World’s Best Teacher” trinkets and “#1 teacher” mugs.  I have cards written in kid penmanship that declare me “Teacher of the Year” or the “Best Teacher Ever.”  But I know better.  I know that I still have a lot to learn.  I also know that I have had a great teacher.  One who will always be “World’s Best Teacher” in my book.

I needed to go to school today.  Changing grade levels means an endless to-do list.  Thankfully, I am really enjoying the change and so the list feels more like “want-to’s” than chores.  The Mister had to work this morning so it didn’t make going in on a beautiful Saturday in September quite so difficult. 

Trudy loves everything about life except her crate, so I decided to take her along.  She is really only a crazy dog when other people are around and the odds of anyone else being at school at 7 on a Saturday morning were very slim.  She bounded through the house at the word, “ride” and did everything she could to jump into the Jeep without help. 

We saw shadows of the cows in the pasture as we headed down the drive.  The heron wasn’t on the dock this morning, but we thought maybe we would see her when we returned.

I decided a hot caramel cider was in order this morning and swung by our local coffee shop drive-through.  Trudy was super excited to hear someone’s voice on the speaker and her tail went crazy when we pulled up to the window and a woman handed her a dog treat!  (Trudy is more excited to see the person than to get the treat, but she still graciously accepted the gift!) The woman chatted with me while my drink was made.  She asked where we were headed and shared that she has a seventh grade boy at the middle school.  I didn’t know him by name, but probably would have recognized him if I saw him.  With only one set of schools in our town, it’s pretty easy to know most everyone that attends.

As I drove to school, the sun was now fully up and the beauty of our little town caught my attention once again.  The residential streets are all lined with beautiful trees: oak, maple, pine, ash, birch, elm… every yard seems to have more than one mature tree and it won’t be long at all now before they will be bare.  The school sits on the edge of residential streets and fields full of corn and grapevines.  With woods around the backside of the building, it really is pretty in its own right. Sitting in my classroom, typing up lesson plans, I am able to look out my window at a beautiful ornamental tree, as golden leaves drip to the ground.

The Mister stopped by after work on his way to pick up hay.  He finished helping a local farmer cut hay last week and was off to collect the round bales he earned in trade.  We have more than enough now to last through the winter, more than we can even store properly, to be honest.  He will find a way to get them covered as best he can as we are grateful for the bounty with three grazers this year.

Back at home I transplanted a perennial from a porch planter to the front bed.  Trudy inadvertently dug it up shortly after I got it planted as she ran wild and crazy around the yard playing with a stick.  I filled bird feeders and cleaned leaves out of the bird bath before filling it for nearly the last time.  Tomorrow we have plans to clean up the remains of the garden.  While it disappointed us this year, one of the joys of gardening is the eternal hope that “next year will be better”. 

My household list for today includes little more than a couple loads of laundry, storing boxes of heirloom dishes my dad brought last weekend and clearing the week’s detritus off the counter before friends come for pizza and cards later tonight.

I’m not sure what it is today, the fall temperatures, the sun speckled through autumn leaves in the yard, the happy puppy at my feet, the smooth transition to a new grade level at school, a husband still delighted by the sight of round bales in the barn or the prospect of an evening filled with laughter that makes me feel so contented, but I’ll take it with open arms.  Days like these make me feel so blessed and downright lucky to live in a small town, in Midwest America.