The arrival of the great detectives

So this week we took delivery of 5 new baby chickens. Yes, we could have hatched our own, but then we might have roosters. And it's the hardest thing in the world to give away a wee rooster you've known since they were an egg. So we bought chicks instead.

A friend told us that the best way to get chicks is to have them delivered from a specialist chicken breeder. So these wee beauties spent their first 48 hours in a box, traveling through the mail.

It was a new experience for all of us, and before their arrival, Mark couldn't settle. He was preparing the brooder for them, putting everything in place so that the moment they arrived, they could relax into their new home like falling into a nice clean bed after a long flight. When I asked him if he was worried, he would answer, “No” in a tone that after 20 odd years of marriage, I knew meant he completely was.

That's the thing about living creatures. Even when you don’t want to, they demand you end up caring. And the vulnerability can be bloody awful.

Two weeks ago, Margaret, one of our full-grown chickens died. She’d suddenly taken unwell, and I'd been trying to nurse her back to health with warm Epsom salt baths, electrolytes, and probiotics. But it didn't work. The thing about chickens is they're so skilled at hiding pain, that when a chicken starts to fail, it's close to the end of the road.

All four of us, pretty-much-fully-grown, humans moped about sorrowfully the whole weekend. And Margaret wasn't even our favorite chicken.

And yeah, I know, it's only a chicken. Except it's not ‘only’ an anything. Value is based on scarcity. If something is rare it is of value. Each life is temporary, and no life is replaceable, yet you can conjure up some diamond that will exist for centuries in a lab. And somehow that’s more important. Just so you know, I'd take Margaret over some prissy wee diamond any time.

Anyway, our 5 new chicks arrived on Wednesday and settled into the brooder noisily. (The journey across country in a box had made them very opinionated.) But like most living creatures after some food, water, and a comfortable night’s sleep, they were much more amenable.

We named them Veronica, Vera, Velma, Daphne, and Agatha - the theme being lady detectives. The reason being that, the longer I live, the more I think of life as some kind of detective story, because you’re consistently finding out unexpected shit as you go along.

I wish someone had told me that as a kid - that life was basically a whole load of new experiences that continually happen. And just when you think you’ve got it sorted, something else happens, and you have to work out how to handle this next thing. And at no point in life do you have it completely sorted, because as one mystery ends, another begins.

The idea of life as a Detective story in which I got to be the lead character, might have helped me right size my expectations, and let me be more accepting of myself when things didn't go my way.

Wisdom is about being open to what you don’t yet know, rather than clinging on desperately to what you already do.

Not long after Lachlan started elementary school, he decided he wasn't going back because he didn’t belong there. Adamant, his wee body shaking with outrage, he explained that everybody at school was just meeting to boast about all the things they knew, and he didn't know any of those things yet, and so he wouldn't go. It took a couple of days to convince him that everyone was going to school to learn stuff, and the other kids in his class - no matter what they claimed - knew roughly as much as him.

I loved the lesson though. My wee 6-year-old changed the way I view all groups, and meetings in general: if everybody knew everything already, they wouldn't be there. No matter how much they might posture, everybody is on as much of a journey as everyone else.

Of course, certain schools I sent my kids to ended up being less educational facility than part prison camp, and certain teachers were shining examples of what type of humans not to be, rather than inspirational beacons. But you have to take the good with the bad.

If I'd known then what I know now, I'd have handled those situations differently. But if I hadn't had those situations then, I don't know how I would possibly know that. Because life is a sequence of learning new stuff, whether you want to or not.

Anyway, it’s only been a couple of days since Vera, Veronica, Velma, Daphne and Agatha arrived but already we’re attached.

Right now our focus is keeping them warm and fed and watered, while they master the confusing tasks of how their legs work, how not to drown in a water bowl, why not to peck another chicken, and the importance of sleeping when it's dark rather than incessantly fucking tweeting. (I'm looking at you, Agatha.)

Their current home is under a heat lamp in a plastic brooder in the bathtub. The brooder boasts five-star chicken facilities courtesy of Mr Mark Tweddle. The bathroom provides spectacularly annoying acoustics suitable for Agatha’s vocal cords.

Over the next couple of days we’ll start to take them out to snuggle and play with them, so that they get used to humans.

In a few weeks, we’ll begin introducing them to Genghis and the other chickens outside. We have to get them grown and acquainted with the flock before they move into the main coop. It's not just humans who are territorial about their lawns.

Now they’re here, there are many mysteries ahead. But one thing is for certain: No matter what happens, Agatha will be reporting back loudly on everything.

Till next week

xo

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Learn more about Lynn’s Story work at YouTellYours.com