Every small town girl has big city dreams. Some involve bright lights and movie stars, stilettos and martini glasses, or even sky scrapers and subways. However, I doubt that anyone’s big city dreams involve a chicken.
Or a racoon, or a skunk. These animals have no place in a city. Rats? Maybe. Cockroaches? Why not. But a chicken? Really? Ok, not really. But a racoon and a skunk? Really.
Let me explain. As you all should know by now, Edward and I recently moved to the ‘big city’ from the boonies. Seriously. We lived just north of nowhere, in the middle of dullsville. When we wanted to get out and do something exciting we would - get ready for it – go for a walk. Nothing ever happened. Ever. There were no buses or public transport of any kind, no buildings over 4 stories and, *gasp* no Starbucks. How did we survive? I’m not sure. But amidst all the boredom, general blandness and blocks of time spent starring into space, not once did we encounter a chicken. Or a racoon. Or a skunk.
So imagine our surprise when, upon purchasing a house in the ‘big city’ we come to realize that we have an animal of some sort living under our front porch. After much debate, we decided that the creature was a skunk, a racoon or a chicken. How did we come to this conclusion? Well, Edward encountered (i.e. had the shit scared out of him by) a (supposed) skunk one night when he was taking out the garbage, but knowing Edward, I am not so sure it wasn’t just a stray cat that he saw, because, as far as I know, skunks don’t tend to rub up against peoples legs and meow. Aside from this rather unreliable eyewitness account, the other evidence we had was the footprints we found at the scene of the crime. These footprints showed that our creature had long fingers, which, combined with the recent vandalism enacted upon our garbage cans, led me to believe that it our critter was not in fact a skunk but actually a racoon.
Yet despite this forensic evidence, Edward, like any good lawyer I suppose, would not admit defeat. In the end, it came to down to me and Edward yelling back and forth like two kids in the school yard:
Edward: “It’s a skunk.”
Wendy: “No –It’s a racoon.”
Edward: “It’s a skunk!”
Wendy: “It’s a racoon!”
Edward: “SKUNK!”
Wendy: “RACOON!”
Edward: “NO! IT’S A CHICKEN!!!!”
At which point we took a moment to just stare at each other and then we both lost it. We burst out laughing and could do nothing but roll on the floor and wheeze incoherently for the next 15 minutes. To this day simply thinking about Edward screaming out determinedly “ITS A CHICKEN!” makes me giggle in the grocery store, earning myself weird looks from the cashier who now thinks I find poultry amusing.
Where did this chicken comment come from? Well, the day of our fateful conversation, Edward had gone out and bought some chicken wire to use to catch our critter with, and as far as we can determine, he just happened to be thinking about that chicken wire during our conversation and had a Freudian slip. Because in the end, we never did find out for sure what our creature was. It could have been a weird skunk/racoon/chicken mix or simply a long fingered chipmunk for all we know. Edward simply filled in the hole with concrete last Saturday when (we hope) the creature wasn’t inside of it. But either way we have not seen any sign of the creature since. So our skunk, racoon or chicken has relocated or they are now entombed under our front porch.
Oh well, at least life in the city isn’t boring!
-Wendy
No comments:
Post a Comment