StanleyWheeler

 

The Great Christmas Chicken Chase:

An after action report and lesson in tactical brilliance.*

 

The story you are about to hear read is true, only the names have been changed to protect the writer.

She came through the door and pulled off her coat.

“What took you so long?” I asked.

“One of the chickens got out. I’ve been chasing it. I couldn’t get it back in.”

The chicken in question was down the lane at the neighbors. They had gone out of town for a few days and had asked us to feed the animals. The lady in question shall remain nameless. She grew up in town and knows not the wily ways of barnyard fowl. Apparently she engaged in the fruitless chase for several minutes.

“I need your help,” she begged. “It ran away.”

Of course she did. She didn’t seem to care that she was interrupting my requisite inviolate time of sitting at the table in my new thermals and my bathrobe while perusing the latest witty memes and political rants on social media. Actually, I was coming to the end of that activity, but the idea of pursuing rebellious poultry pushed me toward petulance.

“Let’s let it calm down for a bit. It won’t go far from the coop. It will come back to be with the others if it’s not bothered.”

After a few minutes, I put aside the pointless diversion and went to don my protective gear for the coming battle. In other words, I put on pants. The shirt and shoes followed, but the key component for any manly activity is pants—don’t leave home without them. I added a jacket, stocking cap, and leather gloves to complete my sassy ensemble.

A warrior must not rush into battle without the weapons to assure victory. A sharp mind and quick reflexes are the forge of victory, but I knew better than to rely on those advantages alone. After all, this was a chicken I was up against. We’re talking five pounds or more of clawed and feathered fury. Those feet are not just for soup. I made a rapid tour about the garage, taking inventory of my resources.

I grabbed a five-foot long rod of some sort of aluminum alloy. I have no idea what it’s for. It has been in the garage since we moved in eight or nine years ago. I cut a length of wire, folded it, and like Ahab touching the harpoons on the Pequod, I bent a catcher into one end. I pinched the skin of my index finger in the pliers only one time, and she pretended not to notice the squelched scream of pain that escaped my gritted teeth. For those of you who are not acquainted with technical terms, a “catcher” is a hook. It’s much like the one at the end of a shepherd’s staff, but much smaller as its purpose is the snagging of a chicken’s foot, rather than a sheep’s neck. I wrapped the rest of the wire about the metal rod, and secured it with a copious quantity of the handyman’s secret weapon: duct tape, or a reasonable substitute. With each wind of the tape I contemplated the object of my obsession, this great white pullet—or whatever color it was. I hadn’t yet laid eyes upon the beast, so my obsession leaned toward the vague and uncertain—but the passion was definitely there. I was ready to chase it round the Horn, around the Norway maelstrom, and around perdition’s flame before I gave it up. Despite my literary ardor, I didn’t really want to have to do any of that.

With the instrument of the chicken’s sure defeat held in my hand, we strode together toward the battlefield.

“It looks like you’re carrying a spear,” she said.

Little did she imagine how appropriate was that image.

My determined stride stopped for nothing—except the cat that walked in front of me and caused me to stumble. Other than that, nothing prevented our determined arrival at the champ de bataille. As we approached, I saw something low to the ground disappear behind the chicken coop. I hadn’t seen enough—only  a dark flash—to  know for certain what the thing was, but my gut told me that it was indeed our quaesitum**.

“It’s gone,” she said.

I walked to the north. The chicken had fled to the back, the east side of the coop. As I moved to my strategic position beyond the north side of the coop, before walking east to block the expected dash of the quarry, I said, “It went behind the coop. Walk back there.”

She walked behind the coop. The red devil came trotting toward me, fleeing from my better half. The hen gave me a look of disdain, or was it mefiance, and moved to my flank along the north side of the coop. This was going exactly as I had envisioned. This chicken was no match for my geniusness***. The pullet slowed at the corner. I advanced slowly. The hen watched me with one wary eye. I had no idea what the other eye was doing as it was on the other side of the creature’s head. Smiling to myself, I began to slide the catcher forward through the grass. The chicken stepped away. I made another tentative probe with the catcher. The trick is to slide the business end of the implement past the chicken and to snag one leg on the draw back.

I suppose this is a good time to admit that I had no confidence in the catcher. I feared that the hook I had fashioned lacked the strength to hold the hen. I worried that the hook would unfold, and the quarry would escape and flee in an agitated and possibly psychotic state—the way many people do after working with me for a prolonged period.

My better half guarded the area at the other end of the coop. The chicken was between us, against the wire on the open side of the coop. I asked her if the other chickens could be secured inside the closed portion of the coop. She indicated they could if I would help her. I leaned my harpoon catcher against the elm tree, deciding on an alternate course. I put away the natural man, suppressing the desire to snag the fowl by the leg and drag it into my clutches in a frenzy of action displaying power and mastery over the cagey egg-layer. The chicken too refuge in the weeds and grass against the wire of the coop.

I walked past the hen. We went to the two entrances on the south side of the coop. A wooden door gave entrance to the closed portion of the coop. An iron gate covered with chicken wire guarded the open side of the coop. I saw two or three catchers of thick, stiff wire hanging from the side of the coop. Here were weapons with which I could once more seize the initiative—and the chicken. I pulled one of the catchers down to confirm my suspicions/hopes, admiring the rigid and unforgiving nature of the metal implement.

I once again tamped down the thoughts of snatching the hen and forcing the shrieking, flapping-feathered fowl into the coop. I reasoned that a gentle, persuasive approach would bear the sweeter fruit. I turned my attention to the iron gate. The rod which secured it was rustier than my foreign language abilities.

My hand went to the handle on the securing rod. My eyes caught movement about three feet away. It was the red hen! She had mounted an attack from the rear. She had us cornered!

I pulled back on the rod, working it back and forth, fighting not only rust, but the offset angle at which it met the latch. The hen came a step nearer. Another chicken within the coop approached the gate. I didn’t know whether she was a Quisling or a Bolivar. The rod came free. I was about to turn the pullet’s maneuver to my rear into my own tactical coup de main. I was all in. With one throw of the dice, I would either take the hen in my trap, snatching the thrill of victory from the agony of defeat****, or loose the rest of the coop’s denizens like a flock of unchained demons upon an unsuspecting world which could not comprehend the terror in store—and not just in stores, but on the streets, in the parks, woods, homes, and meadows. No place would be safe from the poultry menace.

I eased open the iron gate, and stepped slowly to the side so that the gate was no longer between me and the chicken. The pullet avoided my gaze, realizing the devastating impact of both my counter maneuver and the fully armed and operational iron gate. The hen quickly marched by the open gate and over the threshold into the coop to be received by its comrades with welcoming clucks.

My better half and I walked home with the unused catching implement. The cat rejoined us about halfway home. I could tell she was impressed—meaning my wife, not the cat, although…

Some people might call me a tactical mastermind. Others might use words like brilliance and sagacity—and not just because they don’t know what those words mean. I can’t control the effusive praise likely come my way like the steady blast from a fully open firehose. I can only nod in quiet and humble acceptance, smiling with feigned genuine embarrassment when someone mentions the words, “chicken whisperer extraordinaire.”

 

*I realize that it’s not Christmas, and the entire episode cannot by any stretch of the imagination be described as “great.” As for that and the rest of the title, I flash my dramatic license as an affirmative defense.

**I admit that this is the first time I’ve ever used that word—as far as I can remember. It means—as far as you know—“the object of the search.”

***I know. It’s for effect.

****I know—unless you didn’t see what I did there, and if you’re not over 40, you won’t get the reference.

*****Don’t go back and look. I didn’t put a 5 asterisk note, but if you didn’t get the two passing Star Wars references, we should re-evaluate the terms of our association.