Don't Let the Chicken...

It was a warm summer day sometime in August in Vinne, Slovakia.  My brothers and I spent that summer with our family that year. My aunt owned a house that was adjacent to the original farm in which our grandmother previously owned.  As children growing up we were regaled by tales of our grandmother's farm and how it contained nearly every type of farm animal imaginable. It it's heyday her farm had all types of chickens, cows, pigs, rabbits, ducks, geese, and even goats. For us fellow city dwellers going to our grandmother's gave us the opportunity to experience something that we could not at home.

My grandma had a tradition while she was still living that once a week she would kill a chicken for us so that on Sunday we could have fresh Chicken soup and cutlets.  My aunt continued this tradition even after our grandma died.

But this one time we had asked our Aunt if she could kill the chicken with one strange twist...We had asked our aunt that once she had beheaded the chicken to let it roam around.  We were curious to see who the beheaded chicken would chase.   So my aunt agreed to our heinous request, but little did we know...

Once my aunt selected our victim, she went forward and beheaded it with such cool, surgeon like  precision that even Louis XVI would have marveled at the feat. (We will call our chicken friend Louis from now on.) Once this happened my aunt let Louis go and all of a sudden I realized that he began chasing me!  It seemed like everywhere where I turned that damned headless chicken kept following me. His wings would flap violently and he would jump up down with his talons outstretched like he was deliberately trying to chase me.  I tried moving quickly to the right and to the left to deceive my possessed, fowled stalker but somehow I couldn't escape and I almost ran right into Louis. After experiencing that near hit, Louis finally ran out of steam and he collapsed right next to the gate surrounding me and his soul went to Chicken heaven since he was a martyr for the chicken cause.

It was a close call and I learned a valuable lesson that day,  "Don't let the chicken chase you when its head is cut off!"

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