At preschool this morning we had green eggs and ham. Its classic Seuss, silliness with a lesson,
“You do not like them, so you say. Try
them, try them and you may. Try them and
you may I say!” I always love doing my
Sam-I-am bit, and this year it was even better because the eggs came from
chickens who are like family, the ones who live in my very own sister’s back
yard.
Now, I never imagined my sister as the farm girl type, but
she rescued these nearly homeless chickens from a friend who was moving, and
perhaps out of gratitude the little sweeties settled in and started laying
eggs, even though their new home is not exactly on a farm. And because they were so busy laying eggs,
there were plenty for our scrambled green eggs extravaganza. I couldn’t have been more delighted. Until my sister came in this evening with her
sad farm girl face.
Okay, to be more honest it was more like her highly
irritated business manager face, because it’s hard to look like a farm girl
when you’re dressed in your professional girl clothes and have just left an
office full of responsibilities, and come home to find a notice on your door
from City Hall giving you a few days to do something about your chickens. It seems they had wandered into a neighbor’s
yard, prompting a complaint to the City.
I said the chickens’ new home wasn’t exactly a farm, but
it’s pretty darn close. Our “city” has a
population of 600ish. My sister’s lawn
is separated from a cornfield by one house and a narrow excuse for a road. So what I don’t understand about this
situation is why, oh why the neighbor couldn’t have knocked on the door and
said, “Hi. I met your chickens. Could you please make sure they stay out of
my yard?”
If the neighbors had done that, they would have found an apologetic
new chicken keeper very willing to come up with a better way to keep her feathered
family closer to the coop, and as a neighborly bonus they would have gone back
home with at least a dozen cute little eggs, yummy in green but probably
equally tasty in their natural color. What
they may not have known is just how important those chickens are, but sometimes
what you don’t know should make all the difference.
You see, my 12 year old niece has gone through a difficult
time over the past year, to the point of being medicated for depression, which
sadly runs in our family. It’s very
frightening for a parent to face the brick wall of depression standing between
you and your baby. When you find
something that puts a window in the wall, you buy curtains and let it
stay. That’s what the chickens had
become for my niece, sunshine through a window.
My sister isn’t a farm girl, but she gave chicken-keeping the old Dr.
Seuss try because she’s a mother and she cares so much.
Caring is the connection I’m getting to here. It’s interesting to me how seemingly
unrelated parts of a day can be so clearly connected, and this whole
chickens-green eggs-neighbor thing pointed straight to an article that appeared
in my email inbox earlier in the day called The Caring Toolbox. The article was from the website of former
diplomat turned author John Graham, where he shares “practical tips for people
who are creating change in their communities and beyond.” He says caring is: appreciating others’ feelings and needs,
minding all the little interactions, being personal, listening, taking time. My sister’s neighbor, like so many of us on
an ordinary busy crazy day, didn’t take time to ask “Hmm, I wonder why my
neighbors have decided to adopt chickens?”
He didn’t even take time to have a “little interaction,” opting instead
to call City Hall.
My own neighbors have chickens. And
they have turkeys and several other species of birds. In fact I woke up one
morning to a whole flock of some unidentified feathered guys and gals walking
around in my flower bed. On Saturday
mornings I will admit their rooster is a tad irritating. I have always just considered it part of
living in a small rural town, and after today, I will definitely not be calling
City Hall about it. I have no idea why
my neighbors have so many birds but I’m pretty sure City Hall doesn’t either,
so if I wanted to “create change in my community” I guess I’d have to “take the
time” to find out. I don’t have to allow
the birds regular access to my flowerbed, but if I asked their people to keep
them home, and I asked politely and with a certain amount of understanding, I have
confidence that they would be kept home as well as their family of humans could
manage it.
I believe John Graham has the right idea but maybe his suggestions
could be summed up more simply if I just invited the town to green eggs and ham
day at preschool. My sister’s neighbors
could sit on the Circle Time carpet next to my beautiful niece and benefit from
a bit of Seuss: “You don’t like to care,
so you say. Try it, try it and you
may. Try it and you may I say.”
http://johngrahamspeaker.org/coachs-corner
