Sunday, April 27, 2014

It's What They Do

It all started before Christmas when our downstairs neighbor and friend, Jean Lamour, decided to get a couple of young chickens so he and his mom would have fresh eggs each day.  Tim helped him to build a chicken coop that would keep the birds safe from nocturnal critters and dry during the rainy season and once completed all seemed to be well.                                                   
Then around February we heard a noise outside of our bedroom window that sounded like some creature "choking" on a frog.  I asked Tim, "What is that?  Is that one of the chickens and is something wrong with it?"  

The next day we heard the same sound and, again, I asked Tim if it was one of the chickens and was there something wrong with it.  Each day, thereafter, we heard that same sound.  Finally, Sue, our next door neighbor and one of the "Mamas" to the ten toddlers who also live next door, called over and asked, "Diane, what is that sound?" Now I knew it wasn't just me!

March came and the "frog choking" sound while still deep and throaty began to take on the cadence of a rooster crowing.  We could hear him trying to imitate others who were part of the early morning reveille but more often than not he drowned them out with the sheer volume of his call.

With the advent of April the daily 4:30 am-5:00 am alarm is in full mode.  He directs the neighborhood choir in waking up and does so just below our bedroom window.  He is no longer a curiosity or funny and I've asked Jean Lamour if they have plans for a rooster stew any time soon (he just laughs at me).  I've tried to hush my nemesis by shining a flashlight on him, hoping it might startle him enough to quiet down, but then I worried it might frighten the (2) egg-laying chickens. I've tossed food to him thinking he would be more interested in eating than in waking me up but, alas, all to no avail.  He simply grows bigger and louder with each day.

But then, I received another wake-up call if you will.  Tim attended a men's prayer
breakfast and the guest speaker talked about his experience after the 2010 earthquake.  Like most people following that catastrophic event and with its continuing "aftershocks"he was afraid to sleep inside his house and began laying a pallet on an outside porch. What with all the loss, devastation, rumors and such he found it difficult to sleep and was only able to nod off for 3 hours or so at a time. To add insult to injury a rooster decided to nest in the tree right above this fellow's head and began his early morning wake-up call around 4:00 am.  Arrrggghhhh!

He began to devise ways to get rid of that rooster and even had thoughts of how he would "dress" him for a meal.  This went on for several days until one night the man simply prayed, "Lord please allow me to get one good night's sleep."  Sometime later he woke up with a startle as he heard a voice saying, "It's what they do."  "It's what they do?" the man asked himself.  Who? And what do they do?

Still mentally plotting the bird's demise, the next night the man settled into a restless sleep until he was once again startled awake by a voice that said, "It's what they do." As he was pondering the meaning of these words he heard yet again the voice saying, "They crow.  That's what roosters do."  Surprisingly the man went back to sleep and was able to get a solid rest for the remainder of the night.

As the storyteller thought about the voice and shared the incident with his family and friends, he came to the conclusion that God was talking to him and telling him that each time he complained against the bird he was complaining against what God had created the rooster to do.  From that time on whenever he encountered a difficult situation or worked with challenging people, he would remind himself, "It's what they do. Roosters crow."

Hmmmm...of course I had to re-evaluate my thinking after Tim shared this story and while I still do not relish being wakened in the middle of the night I find I am able to fall back asleep more quickly.  It's also kind of funny because just the other day we heard a peculiar sound a few houses away, almost like a bird with a frog in his throat, and sure enough our "mighty bird" was right there encouraging the new guy with a loud and resounding crow.

"Have you ever in your life commanded the morning, and caused the dawn to know its place..."                                                                                    Job 38: 12





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