Rusty the Rooster

My folks raised chickens when we were kids. This was mostly a good thing. We got lots of tasty chicken dinners, and the eggs that were sold got us fancier shoes to wear to school.

I can remember gathering those eggs, though, and that wasn't so much fun. The bastard birds were peckers! It was a classic approach/avoidance situation -- me reaching fearfully into the nests, trying to gently extract an egg from under the hen who would startle me by stinging my wrist with a sudden stunning chomp.
How I hated those birds! It was all right in winter, or if I remembered to wear a sweater or take a jacket, but in summer time I would forget, entering that hen house wearing a sleeveless top, and how in hell are you going to be protected from their vile beaks then?

But worse than the peckers were the cocks! There was one fowl bastard etched permanently into my brain, just as his beak mark is etched permanently on my left ankle, a scar and a memory.

It was bad enough when Rusty was in the pen, because he knew. Whenever he saw us kids walking by, he would puff out his chest, twist his neck back, and then cut loose with a "UR--ur--UR--ur--URRRR!" sound. His cockerel vanity would make our hearts pound with fear.

Our chickens were notorious for seeking and frequently finding freedom. A small hole in the fence, an open gate, a low-hanging tree branch. They could find these things, and then they would clumsily catapault themselves onto the wrong side of the fence. My mother would fret over the resulting orange egg yolks which soon followed after eating all that green grass. We kids however had our own reason to fret. It was that cock. That bastard cock.
I think he sought us out. I think he just wandered around that farm until he found us kids, and then tormented us. He would chase us, like he owned the farm and paid the taxes. And would scare the hell out of us. It was embarrassing to run back to the house, puffing and almost crying, led to this emotional state by a rogue rooster.

We feared for a reason, because if he ever did catch up to us, he could peck our sensitive young flesh and cause a stabbing, stinging pain. Plus, his claws could carve out "Chickenshit!" on our backs (or legs, or face, or chest) if he so desired.

How I hated that bastard cock! Before he came along, I was all over that farm. I was out in the pasture with the calves and cows, off by the creek, down in the meadow, over by the garden, enjoying the freedom that came with living on a farm. He stole that from me.

Why am I thinking about that stinging cock now? Because in the news today, a bunch of animal lovers are indignant that some roosters were treated badly on a farm in BC, and made to enter cock fights.

All I can say is, I wish that bastard Rusty from the farm was there.