Her name was Susan.
She was small, but energetic.
A face half-way between café au lait and crème caramel -- with freckles.
Her almost-yellow eyes radiated far more interest than intelligence.
I was six and in love with her.
She was not my first pet, but she was one of my favorites. A bantam hen that I raised from a chick at my grandmother's.
Before I left Salem, one of my tasks was to repair a portion of fence around my yard. I told you about in my ducks in a row.
The fence came down in a storm, and I made a MASH-like repair of chicken wire to fill the gap. The quick fix ended up lasting for almost two years.
Last March, I humorously noted that "my neighbors and friends had a vague fear that I was going to introduce a flock of Rhode Island Reds to our very proper urban block."
Little did I know that a chickens-in-the-urban-boundary battle was brewing even as I wrote those words. Some of my fellow Salemites were petitioning the City Council to allow residents to raise up to three hens.
I have been thinking about this post for about a week. But my friend, Al French, brought it to a head on Thursday when he sent me link to The Wall Street Journal. It appears that the chicken wars have come to a head in Salem.
For those of us in Mexico, the arguments on both sides sound almost silly. Chickens are loud, dirty, attractive nuisances for predators. Chickens are great pets, economical, and green.
I was returning from my Spanish lesson earlier this week and had one of those where-is-my camera moments. A hen came dashing out of a house on the corner, and dashed right back inside.
I am not an advocate of chickens in the living room. But after living here, I do not understand why Salem's residents cannot loosen up and stop worrying about what their neighbors are doing with their animals. The horse at the top of this blog lives on a residential lot two blocks from me in Villa Obregon.
Ten thousand people live in this little village. Few of the streets are paved, and they are filled with artillery shell size potholes. There are no traffic signals. The stop signs that do exist are treated as parental suggestions. With a mix of cars, trucks, buses, pedestrians, horses, and Twitter-addicted young women on scooters, no one seems to get hurt.
My former neighbors would not be able to navigate. I know that because it has taken me three months to start feeling comfortable driving through the equivalent of a mayhem video game.
I am a libertarian. I came to Mexico believing it was a proto-socialist state. It isn't. There are lots of rules, but very few people pay attention to them. As is true in most societies, custom trumps law.
This is not a libertarian paradise. But it is a place where people tend to follow their own drummers.
And what happened to Susan? Our Chihuahua-Manchester Terrier mix buried her alive.
It was a tragic end for her.
She would be pleased to know, though, that in my little village by the sea, the local dogs and chickens seem to get along just fine.
Not quite Isaiah's wolf and lamb. But it's a start.
She was small, but energetic.
A face half-way between café au lait and crème caramel -- with freckles.
Her almost-yellow eyes radiated far more interest than intelligence.
I was six and in love with her.
She was not my first pet, but she was one of my favorites. A bantam hen that I raised from a chick at my grandmother's.
Before I left Salem, one of my tasks was to repair a portion of fence around my yard. I told you about in my ducks in a row.
The fence came down in a storm, and I made a MASH-like repair of chicken wire to fill the gap. The quick fix ended up lasting for almost two years.
Last March, I humorously noted that "my neighbors and friends had a vague fear that I was going to introduce a flock of Rhode Island Reds to our very proper urban block."
Little did I know that a chickens-in-the-urban-boundary battle was brewing even as I wrote those words. Some of my fellow Salemites were petitioning the City Council to allow residents to raise up to three hens.
I have been thinking about this post for about a week. But my friend, Al French, brought it to a head on Thursday when he sent me link to The Wall Street Journal. It appears that the chicken wars have come to a head in Salem.
For those of us in Mexico, the arguments on both sides sound almost silly. Chickens are loud, dirty, attractive nuisances for predators. Chickens are great pets, economical, and green.
I was returning from my Spanish lesson earlier this week and had one of those where-is-my camera moments. A hen came dashing out of a house on the corner, and dashed right back inside.
I am not an advocate of chickens in the living room. But after living here, I do not understand why Salem's residents cannot loosen up and stop worrying about what their neighbors are doing with their animals. The horse at the top of this blog lives on a residential lot two blocks from me in Villa Obregon.
Ten thousand people live in this little village. Few of the streets are paved, and they are filled with artillery shell size potholes. There are no traffic signals. The stop signs that do exist are treated as parental suggestions. With a mix of cars, trucks, buses, pedestrians, horses, and Twitter-addicted young women on scooters, no one seems to get hurt.
My former neighbors would not be able to navigate. I know that because it has taken me three months to start feeling comfortable driving through the equivalent of a mayhem video game.
I am a libertarian. I came to Mexico believing it was a proto-socialist state. It isn't. There are lots of rules, but very few people pay attention to them. As is true in most societies, custom trumps law.
This is not a libertarian paradise. But it is a place where people tend to follow their own drummers.
And what happened to Susan? Our Chihuahua-Manchester Terrier mix buried her alive.
It was a tragic end for her.
She would be pleased to know, though, that in my little village by the sea, the local dogs and chickens seem to get along just fine.
Not quite Isaiah's wolf and lamb. But it's a start.
