Pigeon-Pop

I had the most interesting conversation with an other mom at the Dojo last night that really illustrated the contrast between my home and that of just about everyone else in the world.

She woke up yesterday to find something fluffy floating in the pool. She wasn't quite sure what it was. It was too large for a rat but too small for a opossum. On closer inspection, the mom and her two young sons, 9 and 7, figured out it was a wild rabbit that had drowned in the pool. The dad is out of town right now so the mom turned to the 9 year old and said "O.K., your the man of the house, get that out of the pool." The boys were horrified, especially the 9 year old because of the duty in which was placed upon such young shoulders. So, with much finagling and the use of gloves, pool skimmer and a plastic garbage bag, the three of them managed to get it out. I think they just put it in the garbage. She was so freaked out by the incident, so I shared with her what happened at our house this week

At our house, by contrast, had a slightly similar event this week. The only similarities are an animal and water, but the rest is quite different.

We have some pigeons that a friend of ours keeps here. The Pigeon Guy (the name the boys gave him) and El Patron have some arrangement about boarding and breeding some of the Pigeon Guys birds. One day last week or so, Pigeon Guy decided that there was a hen he didn't really want any more and that we could keep. Rather than putting this hen the loft with the squeakers (young birds learning to fly) he let it go. This hen isn't homed anywhere so she just kind of stuck around. Sometimes she would go in a loft but not always. It was sad, she was just lost. A couple of days ago I went to check on the birds and I found this poor hen dead in a bucket of water. Well, honestly, I didn't know for sure if it was her and I was terrified that it was one of the good fliers. I panicked, not like the other mom though. I called my oldest son to get it out of the water and see who it was. (Here is where the similarities totally stop) J. was so excited because his Poultry Leader told him that the next bird that dies she will help him to assemble its skeleton for display. They had a skeleton of a pigeon in a glass box at the last Poultry meeting to talk about bones and skeletal structure of birds. She told him that next time a bird dies wrap it up in newspaper and freeze it and she will help him make one. She knows how to boil it down just right so that all of the ligaments are in tack but the flesh and organs come off. J. was fascinated with it and had been waiting for a bird to die. I know, a little morbid, but at least he wasn't wanting it to be his brother. He picked up the bird from the water, sans gloves, checked the band to make sure that it wasn't our best racer, then pretended that she was flying by flapping her wings as he ran to the house to put her in the freezer. Seeing how next week is spring break for us, they might do it then.

You might think this odd, to have a bird like this in your freezer. When E.P. and I first got married and were living with his parents, I went to check her freezer for something to make for dinner and found....yes....a hawk that E.P. had put in the freezer when he worked at a pet store when he was in High School. She figured he would eventually come back for it so she left it there. I'm thinking that this was a sign of things to come, but I had already said "yes" and was committed.

Someone once told me that it must very interesting living at our house with all the animals and the things that we do with them, washing chickens for show, tube feeding baby lambs in the kitchen, training Homing Pigeon, the list goes on. Well yup it is and I wouldn't have it any other way.