Prologue - 180 Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwiches
I am wandering in my Grandmother’s back yard at her citrus ranch in Tustin, California. I’m no longer content to drop pebbles down the old, rusty pipe that is all that remains of an abandoned and sealed well. I have larger plans this day. I have recently begun kindergarten, and I am disturbed and amazed by all that I see and hear among the children and the teachers that I have to join each weekday. I have a complete sense of loss of control and power in my young life. All of these confusing feelings weigh heavily on my soul. Today, however, I have other thoughts. I want to find the mother hen that has recently hatched out six new baby chicks. My grandmother keeps several hens and a couple of roosters in a system of chicken-wire pens out near the tractor shed. The tractors are used on the 40-acre citrus ranch that my great-grandfather started. He is long dead as is my grandfather. The ranch is run by my grandmother and my two uncles, one recently returned from the army and WW II.
I have a strong desire to find this mother hen and then, by maneuvering myself between the mother and her chicks that always follow her, separate them. I don’t want to harm either the mother hen or her babies; I just want to have the power of control over them, even if only momentarily. I locate her beyond the tractor shed. Her babies are all in a line behind her and appear very dependent upon the protection of their mother. My anticipation is heightened by this aspect of the chicks’ vulnerability. I make my move. The mother hen has a greater purpose in her existence than I in mine. She easily avoids my five-year-old feint and takes her babies, scurrying behind her, under the safety of some old lumber lying around behind the tractor shed.
I am left feeling powerless and disturbed.
I am wandering in my Grandmother’s back yard at her citrus ranch in Tustin, California. I’m no longer content to drop pebbles down the old, rusty pipe that is all that remains of an abandoned and sealed well. I have larger plans this day. I have recently begun kindergarten, and I am disturbed and amazed by all that I see and hear among the children and the teachers that I have to join each weekday. I have a complete sense of loss of control and power in my young life. All of these confusing feelings weigh heavily on my soul. Today, however, I have other thoughts. I want to find the mother hen that has recently hatched out six new baby chicks. My grandmother keeps several hens and a couple of roosters in a system of chicken-wire pens out near the tractor shed. The tractors are used on the 40-acre citrus ranch that my great-grandfather started. He is long dead as is my grandfather. The ranch is run by my grandmother and my two uncles, one recently returned from the army and WW II.
I have a strong desire to find this mother hen and then, by maneuvering myself between the mother and her chicks that always follow her, separate them. I don’t want to harm either the mother hen or her babies; I just want to have the power of control over them, even if only momentarily. I locate her beyond the tractor shed. Her babies are all in a line behind her and appear very dependent upon the protection of their mother. My anticipation is heightened by this aspect of the chicks’ vulnerability. I make my move. The mother hen has a greater purpose in her existence than I in mine. She easily avoids my five-year-old feint and takes her babies, scurrying behind her, under the safety of some old lumber lying around behind the tractor shed.
I am left feeling powerless and disturbed.