“There are days when it’s not worth chewing through the leather straps.”
Emo Phillips
It’s a gloomy Easter Sunday in the Ozarks. The five day forecast portents more of the same. I had planned to flop atop my last unbroken Chaise recliner, let the sun tan the wrinkles and finish Hanna’s “Long, Last, Happy: New and Selected Stories.”
Easter was once a big deal. The offspring received new clothes and tried to behave during the long and poorly sung Lutheran service. I was never sure why we were Lutheran. Dad came from a disinterested Catholic background and Mom’s parents shopped around before deciding on Martin Luther’s Protestant apostasy. My grandmother’s grandparents were Lutheran. But she grew up Methodist, as her maternal grandfather was a minister in that particular denomination. I think she felt that embracing Lutheranism was a way of returning to her Swiss/Scandinavian roots. Perhaps cousins from the Krattley side encouraged her to worship a Teutonic God, tolerant of sloppy-drunk weddings; a forgiving God whose mercy a Jurgensmeyer or Rohm believed saved them from eternal damnation after peeing on a slow moving flower girl. I doubt if Christians cleaning up after an Assembly of God wedding contend with pools of piss and upchucked sauerbraten.
Easter at home was more fun. Dad would put on his I'm the Lord of this House tee shirt and retire to the garden shed. While we quivered before the shed door, Our Savior would leap out and shout, “He has risen!” He would then drench us with a water hose. We would scream in mock terror while Jesus in plaid Bermuda shorts chased us about the backyard. After fulfilling Scripture, the Messiah retired to his lawn chair, toasting his resurrection with cans of cold Falstaff.
This unorthodox ritual replaced the traditional Easter egg hunt. Dad did not abide chicken. His mother raised chickens and he claimed to have been force fed the bird for breakfast, lunch and dinner. After a judge encouraged his enlistment in the Navy, Dad vowed never again to eat fowl meat or shelled goo from a bird’s cloaca. And to my knowledge, sixty two years later, a drum stick or juicy breast has never touched his lips. He was not a purist, however. He did eat cake and other dessert related foodstuffs that used eggs as an ingredient.
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Late spring, 1966
Dad dropped me and Poop Pot off at Grandma M’s hovel. She was a short woman who treated children with terse, medieval riposte. All of us were afraid of her, especially Poop Pot. My little sister stuttered and Grandma M considered this a sign of mental retardation. Her stuttering became more pronounced when she was nervous. It didn’t help that Grandma thought her name was Gloria.
“Gloria, come here!”
“I’m n-n-n-o-o-t Gl-o-o-or-ria!”
She grew a huge vegetable garden and raised chickens. The grand kids were required to work when paying her a visit. I didn’t mind pulling weeds or watering but I hated messing with the chickens. After putting in a solid two hours of gardening, she decided to give us a breather. While we sat beneath the biggest oak, wondering when Dad would rescue us from our laborious gulag, Grandma waddled out and handed us tepid tea. Poop Pot made the mistake of stuttering for ice. Grandma looked at me and rolled her eyes as if to say, the girl isn’t right. Suddenly she popped out of her rusty metal chair.
“Johnnie, go kill a chicken.”
I don’t remember saying anything. Kill...a...chicken? I was aware that chickens were killed...somehow. How else does one eat them? But the methodology involved was a mystery I preferred not to know. Before I could figure a way out of this unexpected and incomprehensible assignment, she waddled off.
Poop Pot, her eyes wide, asked, “Are y-y-you real-l-l-ly go-go-go-ing to k-k-ill a ch-chi-cken?”
I do remember wishing I had brought my pellet gun. Dazed, I wandered into the smelly pen. My only thought was how to kill a chicken without actually touching one. And then it hit me. Of course, I’ll throw rocks! It didn’t take long before the pen went wild with flapping, squawking birds. Because I was busy flinging stones at my rattled prey, desperately trying to take flight, I failed to see Grandma M, her stubby legs churning, grab me from behind.
“What are you doing?”
“Trying to kill a chicken?”
She released me and grabbed the nearest hen. Ignoring the beating wings, she carried the bird to a stump. I noticed the hatchet at the same time she chopped down on the struggling hen’s neck. Poop Pot, who had followed Grandma M to the pen, collapsed. She missed the chicken stagger in headless circles before following her to the ground, dying atop a stream of fresh blood. Good God.
Dénouement: Grandma M made Poop Pot eat a dirty Tums and drink water that had stuff floating in it. I was replaying the savagery in my mind, convinced that a pellet gun was a more humane way to murder a chicken. Or electricity. Dad laughed when Grandma M relayed the details of our traumatic afternoon.
