The Mad Rooster

When I was 5 my dad in his infinite wisdom decided to move us from here:

to here:

New Boston was the closest town to our new farm, "St. Johns" if you will-county seat and all. Fortunately, I was blessed to live in their version of "Concho". For those of you who don't know what that means, I lived in Malta (the armpit of New Boston).

Anyway, back to the story. We were chicken farmers! Complete with chicken houses, 100 acres of ponds, grasses to your chest, a stink that hung around on a rainy day, and one ancient junkyard in the back ( I guess people there just let the vegetation cover their junk instead of taking it to the dump). We roamed and played; finding entertainment and snakes and junk when 3 channels ( ABC, CBS and NBC) couldn't.

Each chicken cycle would bring an eventful day, when, if we were lucky, would be home from school to see. The day the baby chicks were picked up to take to Pilgrims Pride. They would bring 18 wheelers, crates by the dozens, and loaders with drivers who didn't speak English. Time after time they would load up the chickens and pack them away-squaking and feathers flying in the air. Invariably 3- 5 were always left behind.

We would stock our chicken coop with the left overs. Nothing eventful ever came of doing that until one spring.

As always we took what was left and this time included a white rooster.

In his homemade coop with the other chickens, he lived a chicken king's life. We, the Butler kids, were in charge of feeding them and other barn chores. I remember walking down to do chores. The rooster would walk, (stalk) his prey; strutting his know-it-all chicken strut, ever coming closer and closer to us- the dancing, nervous kids. We would hop on one foot and the other trying to swallow down screams, pushing each other closer to him away from ourselves.

With quick flaps he would rise off the ground and fling his whole body at us. Feathers and kids would race each other to see which left the pen first. As often as not, some little kid's behind would be his prize. We were pecked in the legs, the behind, the flailing hands. Screaming and yelling, we would vow to never come back.

Until we were forced to do chores again.

It was during this time that I started to actively volunteer to baby sit Nikki instead.

"Mad rooster, Mad ROOSTER'"

could be heard every evening as chores were quickly done.

"Mad Roo-STER!!"

we would scream each time we were chased. The rooster was a demon. He would stalk us. He would look at us with knowing eyes. He would hid until we came into target rage. He took on the personality of the devil himself; his coxcomb -shiny devil red, his eyes glowed with embers of hate, his tail was forked and pointy. We believed he dreamed up ways to catch us and torment us daily.

It was so bad that we became puddles of tears and pleas. My dad, at first didn't listen I am sure. As time wore on, it was apparent that this rooster aka the demon hated us kids with a passion. He ruled the barn and our nightmares.

One day we loaded up the horse trailer and couldn't get the Mad Rooster to leave his trailer- the devil's living room. For he had taken to hiding there to surprise unsuspecting loitering kids.

We had no choice but to take him with us. We figured, he would either get kicked by the horses on our way to the fairgrounds or not. We unloaded and found that evil never dies. We saddled up and as we were waiting to ride in the arena, we noticed the Mad RooSTer leaving. He strutted to a adjacent coop and joined his new flock.

"Yea, the Mad ROOsteR is GONE!, YEA" we chanted as we road away. The devil had a new home.

Recently we bought chicks to have fresh eggs. I love/hate them. I make my kids change the water and food- pick them up as needed. They will be the ones to gather the eggs for evil never dies.