Current mood:	thrilled
Current music:	Mendelssohn - Symphony No. 4
Entry tags:	chicken, cluck, conversation, fort tryon park, journal

Gallus domesticus

I had the most riveting conversation today. At the park in the late afternoon, I wrote in my nonvirtual journal and read for a couple of hours. Instead of going back the way I came, I decided to go a backway that involved a little more greenery and less pavement. I descended a tunneled stairway and continued on a gentle downward slope toward an empty lawn and a few big rocks to climb down. I happened to look off to some side shrubbery/bushery, and caught a quick look at a chicken. Its head poked forward each time it took a step. I didn't give the bird a second thought then. I must have walked about 20 feet before I thought to myself, "Was that really a chicken?" I pictured its red comb and wattle and white-and-grey-speckled neck, and its black-feathered body. Then I thought about how stray animals are extremely rare here in the city, and chickens are not necessarily indigenous to these here parts. I stopped in my tracks and continued thinking, "Heh, what the cluck is a chicken doing here?" I turned around and decided to check it out. A two-foot, meshy metal, black vinyl-coated fence separated me from the shrubbery/bushery and the chicken. I leaned against the fence to get as close as possible. The bird (this most closely resembles my new friend) and I eyed each other, then I thought, might as well - there's no turning back. So I talked to him. Here's the conversation as well as I can remember it:

M: brrrock, brock brock ...
C: (stares blankly at me)
M: bockbock, bagawk!
C: (a little more excited) bockbockbockbockle ...
M: bockbockbockbock bagawk bock
C: bockbockbock bagawk? bagawkbagawk ...
M: brrrrock, bock bock bock
C: (almost like a turkey) tuckle-tuckle-tuckle-tuckle-tuckle bock bagawk!

Mind you, this was not a quiet discussion. People had actually gathered around. The area where I had written and read was part of Fort Tryon; people were looking down from the tall brick walls, more people were gravitating through the tunnel I had just declined. The chicken and I paid them no attention ...

M: (noting how excited C was) tuckle-tuckle-tuckle-tuckle bockbock, bock!
C: (perhaps impressed at my fluency) bock, bock bock bock tuckle-tuckle-tuckle-tuckle-tuckle bock bagawk!
M: brockbrock brock bagawk
C: bock? bock bock
M: bagawk? bagawk?
C: bagawk. bock bock bock

Then the chicken noticed everybody watching us and hid underneath some large leaves. He didn't seem to appreciate that our dialogue attracted an audience. I left the chicken in peace. I turned away from the staring crowds and chuckled the whole way home.