The Tough Days

I have never buried a chicken before. Ron has always saved me that sadness. I have delivered to the woods a chicken who passed in order to feed the wildlife, but when we have a hen who passes in the summers when we have little chickens running around, to be safe, we bury her on the property. 

Last week, I dug my first hole and buried our sweet Silver. It was heartbreaking. 

On the same day Silver passed away, we found out our son has long COVID, and I am pretty sure Ron and I are having own own struggles with something along those lines. Ron has been so busy working in slow motion (at least slow motion for him, he’s still faster than I am) planting the garden that I realized it was going to be up to me to bury Silver. 

The last time I wrote, I mentioned that Silver was very sick. She had a terribly sour crop and a terrible water belly, and it had come on pretty fast. It had been a long time since we had water belly troubles, so I decided, if Silver made it through the first night, I would try to drain her water belly to buy her more time. 

This level of veterinary care is not my strong suit, which is why I had never done it before, but I felt I had to try to learn in order to get Silver more time. She was such a great hen. I spent the day watching video after video and asking for help from more experienced farmer friends. That afternoon, I went and bought the materials, and that evening, my son and I completed the procedure on Silver. 

It was a success, but I did not have much hope. Silver was in pretty bad shape. I think I waited too long. I think, if I had known what to do and done it earlier in that day, she might have had a chance. My anxiety and over-thinking delayed me, and I hate myself for that. 

It was hard day burying that poor baby. Ron had to come help me after I started hitting rocks and root, but I dug for a long time, so slowly because, right now, I am in a “down” time from COVID and do pretty much everything in slow motion. When I was putting the dirt back over her, I just broke down. 

I read a long time ago that the backyard chicken movement in the United States wasn’t exactly great for the welfare of chickens because a lot of people who don’t know what they’re doing keep chickens. I wondered about my own inability to help Silver, and my mind went back to that article I read. 

As I sat crying over Silver, I had the urge to just stop, to quit keeping chickens. Maybe I am too sensitive for this. Maybe I need more veterinary skill, as there are not many vets who will see a chicken, and vet bills are so outrageous now that corporations have bought up vet offices that most people can’t afford to take a chicken to the vet anyway. 

I remembered the last time I truly felt like giving up on chicken keeping. It was the day of our first hawk attack, and we lost Lucy’s twin to the hawk. Pumpkin had been raising babies at the time, and I could find neither Pumpkin or her babies. After searching for at least half an hour, I remember dropping to my knees and swearing I was done with keeping chickens, that my heart was too soft for this job, but then, by some miracle, we found Pumpkin’s babies frozen and hiding in a pile of leaves. It was an extra miracle that we had not stepped on them as we had been back and forth through the area many times. And then Pumpkin returned as well. 

I kept going. I decided to keep going after Silver too. I had new knowledge, another skill, and I would do better for the next one, I thought. 

After I finished burying her, I found a flat stone, wrote her name and dates with a paint pen, and drew little chicken feet on the stone, so, if we sell our property, the next people will know who Silver was. Silver is buried in the same area that Schubert is buried. Schubert was Silver’s mother. 

There have been many tough days of late for our family, it seems. I didn’t fully understand how serious long COVID is, but finding out that our son has it and reading more about what this means for him has been a blow. I have written about my son before. He’s a cellist, and he’s good. Right now, he can hardly play more than half an hour without being in pain and/or then collapsing in exhaustion afterwards. The Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is real, but that’s only part of it. His lungs are still struggling, and brain damage is almost always likely with long COVID. The COVID literally shrinks the brain. I can seem some cognitive struggles. I feel some of them in myself, and they are scary. What a mean, mean thing to do to such a young boy. 

It has been nearly three months since our son had COVID, and the struggle is still so serious. After he “went down,” as I call it, from exhaustion again this weekend, we made the difficult decision to pull him out of all his music activities for the whole summer.

I think we all feel a little bit lost in the world right now. We had been downsizing our farm in anticipation of travel to Boston for his music in the upcoming year. Now, we don’t know what to do but be shocked and worried. On top of this, our son was just getting to the point where he was a help to us on our homestead. He could mow and turn over soil, and he was the best wood chopper. Now, we’ve lost him for some time. What a devastating thing all the way around.

But, today, as I write this, it is a beautiful day. My son is resting, and Ron decided to rest today since it is Father’s Day. The sun is warm, but the breeze is cool. The shadows are long from the trees, and the chickens are enjoying a few more gorgeous days before the heat dome comes. I am going to close my eyes and hope the universe will tell me what to do, help me heal our son because wester medicine really doesn’t know a lot about this. I am going to try to rest too. 

And, tomorrow, I will go to the store and get watermelon for the chickens and ducks because some serious heat is coming. I hope Mary Jane and Rooster can make it. I don’t want any more tough days right now.