Now, I'm a city girl....but, not always. I grew up in a small mid-western town, where we did small town things. Today, I happened to ask a fellow employee, a native of Russia, whether she had ever killed a chicken. It's a long story about how we actually got to the point of discussing killing chickens, but just let me tell you, in brief, it involved wild turkeys doing mating dances and a rogue coyote, in the trash, in New Mexico.
"No", she replied. She had grown up a city girl, in Moscow, and understood nothing about killing chickens.
Well, I knew right then and there, I had to tell her about backyard chicken coops and how, as a preschooler, I participated in the slaughter of numerous fowl, and lived to tell about it.
My grandparents "kept" chickens, in their backyard, behind the garage. I remember feeding them and that they frightened me. "Keeping" chickens also required collecting their eggs and eventually killing some, for our family to eat.
My dad and grandmother were the deed doers. Grandma would grab the chickens, give them a yank and break their necks. But, that didn't kill them. The bodies of the chickens would then be placed, neck out, under a bushel basket and round, little Nancy, would get the job (they must have thought that I liked doing it) of sitting on the down-turned basket.
Dad would then use a small hatchet to lop off the head, while the body continued to flop around and I would have to hang on, to the basket for dear life, until the body stopped moving. It was not fun. I remember it all quite vividly.
My friend was horrified.
However, the experience did not make me non-chicken eater. Fried or baked. Chicken is my favorite meat. But, to this day, I am a wee bit leery of anything in a bushel basket.
Dear Lord. Memories can be a blessing. We learn from the past. Lead us toward a better future. Show us how to become better Christians.
No comments:
Post a Comment