Chickens Crossing

It's sprinkling just enough to turn the streets damp and confound the windshield wipers. I'm cruising one of the oldest streets in the neighborhood, a tree-lined and terribly historic thoroughfare, when from one of the lawns of one of the lesser mansions, comes a chicken. It's directly in my path and without the merest glance into my rear view mirror, my foot automatically hits the brakes, causing the little car to go into a mild skid and my heart to very nearly implode. The chicken gives me a snooty look and continues across the street as if it had every right not to cross at the light. Just when I'm giving thanks for my narrow escape and without any warning at all, both lanes are suddenly awash in chickens and traffic comes to an abrupt and unhappy standstill.

People are out of their cars, cursing and clapping their hands, shooing the birds and running in all directions. It's very much like a barnyard of.......well, chickens.

I count nine in all. Nine chickens casually crossing a busy avenue in the middle of a city with fairly strict health codes. It's oddly exhilarating. When the last one is safely across, people climb back into their cars and traffic resumes. There's no particular indication that anyone except me has found this to be unusual and since I have no desire to call attention to the fact that I found it very much out of the ordinary, I pull back from the curb I so nearly hit and point the little blue car toward home.

At the intersection though, I can't resist a glance at the station wagon next to me. It's filled with children, laughing, pointing and flapping pretend wings. The soccer mom at the wheel looks exasperated but when she meets my eyes and I smile, she smiles back and then we both dissolve into such helpless laughter that we nearly miss the green light. She looks one way, I look the other, and then we give each other a mutual chicken-free thumbs up and go our separate ways.

The world can be a ghastly place, filled with ugliness and unkindness. We need more silliness, more lighthearted moments. We need to hold onto to our sense of wonder longer.

In a word, we need more chickens.