He said no chickens. He did not say no peacocks. How one woman’s respect for precise wording launched a ranch full of questionable choices—starting with six broken ribs and a hospital bed.
My husband’s first hard rule was simple. No chickens. That was the line in the sand. So naturally, a few years later, I found myself planning a small army of peacocks. Because if there is one thing I respect, it is the precise wording of a rule.
Twelve hours before the peachicks arrived, I was in the regional trauma hospital emergency room. I had gotten into a wreck. Totaled my jeep. Broken six ribs. And all I could think about was that I was supposed to drive to get the chicks the next day.
The morning Luke passed, I buried him myself with six broken ribs. Then I sat down and started reading everything I could.
By six weeks old, Han and Leia still looked like toddlers. All fluff and ambition. If one wandered out of sight, the other panicked. That’s when I started worrying about what would happen if one of them died.
I was two weeks into owning peachicks. I had lost one to circumstances beyond my control. And I had tripled down by deciding to hatch seven eggs myself while recovering from six broken ribs.
Two tiny chicks, one teleconference, and the slow realization that boundaries mean nothing to three ounces of bird with opinions.
Morpheus quickly got nicknamed ‘my problem chick.’ Every night the whistle began. Thirty minutes. Sometimes longer. I tried everything. Then I tried opera.
Peachicks pick at everything. Freckles. Seams. Each other. One morning I found Morpheus had scalped Neo. The victim was fine. The perpetrator had already forgotten.
Han and Leia were outgrowing everything faster than I could build it. I needed outside quarters. I had promised James ‘no coop.’ So I built a greenhouse. With perches. And heaters. And cameras.
Morpheus and Neo inherited the rabbit hutch and were thrilled about it. Then I let them out on the porch floor and discovered something I hadn’t planned for at all. They were going to follow me anywhere. I just had to figure out where to go.
Morpheus and Neo were ready to move out. The older birds had opinions about that. The cats had feelings about it too. Nobody asked the cats.
Eight weeks of short supervised walkabouts. Then one morning they just didn’t come back to the pen. They were already home.