Why did the rooster cross the road?
The arc of my infatuation with Rocky the rooster has not progressed past a few chance encounters. Recently I wrote about the bird, now known to strut his tail feathers near the health center at the university. My first greeting was the day he was literally chasing me down the sidewalk.
That day I took it in stride and kept walking toward my car, and Rocky the rooster slipped into the bushes.
Other days, I could hear him crow somewhere in the distance, the way one might hear a foghorn hidden behind a gray mist or a distant church bell. I found myself listening for him on quiet evenings when I was nearly the only person walking along Warner. When you stretch your ears, you can make out even subtle sounds among the rhythmic nest call of a dove or the rapidfire chirps of little birds in trees. Rocky makes a lot of noise, even when he's at a distance and muffled by urban life.
I have not yet actually searched for him, but I look for him, and am reassured when I know he's still out there.
My friends give me clues of my new infatuation.
Bossman said that he saw the bird chasing after a blonde woman one day when he was walking from his car.
“Maybe he likes blondes,” my boss said.
“No. He was just looking for me.”
On another afternoon, Anina texted.
“I saw your rooster crossing Warner Street,” she reported, which means he was headed toward the main campus where I work.
“Yep. He's been looking for me,” I said knowingly. “The mystery is solved as to why the rooster crossed the road.”
Rocky isn't the first bird in my life, nor will he be the last.
For most of my adult life my most frequent companion has been my rubber chicken. You can find him on Facebook if you search for “Heather's Rubber Chicken.” Coolness points if you subscribe.
I've carried a rubber chicken since my late 20s, not always, but always when I travel. It's fun when he is discovered during security checkpoints. Usually it gives the security guard a chuckle at what must otherwise be a dismal job.
Similar to the Travelocity gnome, I love to take pictures of the rubber chicken in odd places. He and I posed with the Parthenon as a backdrop, and I snuck him out in the glass-encased lounge at the Guinness Brewery in Dublin. He's been spotted at the entrance of the Hagia Sophia, gazed up at Half Dome and spent many hours lounging at my Sacramento River.
I don't wave him around, because that's just not my style. It's more of a stealth move: camera and chicken out, snap of the photo, then back in the bag. But recently I was caught by a few of the teachers in our Fulbright Teaching Excellence and Achievement program when we had visitors from foreign countries in California for February and March.
Immaculate of Kenya formed a special fondness for the rubber one, and I wasn't one to intervene with what soon became a “thing.” She tucked him under her arm like he belonged there, and her regularly radiant smile seemed even brighter when the two were almost one.
On nearly the final day before her departure, Immaculate fell asleep on a purple velvet chair (yes it really was purple and velvet) while we were waiting for our table for 22 at Old Spaghetti Factory in Sacramento.
I was sad, but I knew what had to be done next.
“You slept with him,” I told Immaculate. “He's yours now.”
The two had already been inseparable, and now it was official.
I'm glad she has kept me posted that he is wellloved. The first photos included the rubber chicken in her lap, her huge smile letting me know the infatuation remained. The next photo included him strapped into a seatbelt on the plane to Nairobi. Other photos are from Kenya, with the educator surrounded by her also radiant pupils, and the rubber chicken front and center.
I have no regrets. Another rubber chicken will be along shortly. In fact, one has already come and gone. Mom ordered me a rubber chicken for my birthday next week, but it was the wrong bird.
She bought one of those squawkers you see on YouTube when people obnoxiously learn how to squeeze the toy so he sings Bohemian Rhapsody.
“Thanks Mom, but you bought the wrong chicken.
“I prefer a more traditional chicken,” I explained. “This one is just not my type.”
Mom always strives to make me happy, and another is on its way.
If all goes as planned, I'll soon have some photos of my new chicken and Rocky the rooster.