I may be early…

Day 204 of 365

My writing here in the blog may be a little brief this week. We’ll see. I really want to finish my essay on crows, but I am overwhelmed with an idea I have to write about–and then pitch. It’s always risky to fully write an essay and then try to find a home for it. I am such a cautious writer that I tend to pitch to places, get approval, and then write the piece. But this one is going to have to be written first for any editor to get it.

It’s on chicken intelligence, and normally, I would never in a million years think that anyone would publish it, but this weekend, the New York Times published a piece on researchers studying chicken intelligence. It’s my opening, I feel. I have to try to write this. I have about 2,000 words so far. It’s going to have be cut way down by the time I finish it, but write it I must.

I was just telling a friend this weekend that I suspect, in ten years, the general public will have a better understanding of chickens and chicken intelligence, and I won’t seem like the “crazy chicken lady” anymore. There has been a lot of research in the last ten years, and it’s groundbreaking–and it confirms what I see every day of my life. I am hopeful conditions for chickens could get better.

Then, after that conversation, I was reading another article about something else–actually about COVID–and there was a sentence that stood out to me: I may be early, but I’m not wrong.

And so I have to write this essay on chickens. Please cross your fingers for me!