The Chick meca

I recently purchased chicks, from a wonderful chick company in Alabama. As I waited patiently for my day old chicks to arrive, I started to think of the stress and strife these fresh out of the incubator critters were facing.

*Hatched from artificial light, and warmth, with no clucking hen to encourage them out of their shell

*Plucked from a nice warm home, vaccinated and shoved in a box with a hand warmer, small amounts of food, and no water

*Bounced and bobbled all over the country, in heat and cold, and darkness

*Arriving 3 days later in a room where boxes are bounced on top of you and weird voices are complaining that you're peeping to loud

* Being picked up and transferred to another artificial source of heat, food you haven't tasted before and faces peeking in at you every 10 seconds to see if your feet are up in the air.

Sounds like a lot of family trips I took when I was a kid, but seriously, the will to survive this amazing journey is well, Amazing! What mammal, animal, reptile, insect or alien can do such a thing? The answer is pretty much all of them. We've seen it with chicks, children that fit in the palm of your hand, spiders that walk on the busy streets of NY. or a pack of lions that pounce on a baby wildebeest dragging it into the water, where an alligator decides to join in the fight, yet the damn thing survives.

Survival, it's what we all do, some of us do it a bit better then others. I was recently put in a situation, where survival was not the choice my friend decided he wanted. With a gun to his head and 4 others surrounding his room, he wanted to end it. Luckily, his parents stepped in, all the way in Michigan, and called the cops, who eventually tackled my friend and took him to be psychologically analyzed. He's fine, and he's just another guy you'd meet on the street, cute, funny and able to liven up a party. But something switched in his head for just a moment, and for that moment, nothing mattered. He didn't care that he had a caring family, a group of friends who would go out of their way to help him, a job, food on the table, heat, and love. It is that moment where we have to test our strengths, should we survive or should we cry out to be saved. He cried out, and we were there to hear him, and I am glad he is in my life.

What's this have to do with chicks, well they are dealt with many of the same toils and troubles we are in life, and if you can survive a trip like they do at one day old, you can survive almost anything. I am grateful for my chicks ability to survive tough situations, but I am most grateful that I have a friend who found the strength in himself, not to pull the trigger. I love you bro.

Are you for real?

Well yesterday was indeed a good day, until I was forced to shove a 6'5" 35ish man out a door, while face to face with an opposing 6'2" man screaming in my face, " Let's go, I will take this outside, let's go. " Let me tell you standing on 3" heels with a 5'6" build is really a challenge when you have beer and adrenaline pushing on every ounce of your tired body. What are people thinking? This is Jericho Vermont! Why can't we all be happy, the sun is shining and has been for over 12 hours, there were no thunderstorms to cloud our minds, and people are on vacation with their families enjoying a night of dancing to the 80's they grew up to. I guess the real issue is that people need an excuse to do anything. Why not calmly sit down and discuss the reason their 6wk old baby was standing being cradled to sleep 5 ft away from a pounding beats of Billy Idol or Y.M.C.A! Yeah I know you're thinking why was the baby there in the first place? Well they were eating food at 10pm, but the manager on duty as well as ourselves ( bartenders/waitresses) might have suggested that they leave. But the child was asleep. Either that or so stressed from the beat, he had no choice to fall asleep, that is after all a stress response in animals. Needless to say no blood was shed, the situation was apprehended and the baby left the dance floor.
The argument: the family with the baby has had 4 kids, the women who had the guts to complain, had tried to conceive for 2 years and had 1.. This was her first time out with her husband in 4 years alone. Which one is the better parent? That's up to the individual, but my bet is the latter.
Being a bartender is a fun and fast paced lifestyle, you have to love to chat it up even when your sinuses are screaming at you and every time the base speaker thumps so does your eye sockets. And it is a mentally challenging. Their are a lot of wonderful people out there and they have their issues like the rest of us, but this is Jericho, Vt , don't be in my face when you're 6'5" asking for a fight. We're a peaceful town and work on resolving our issues with conversation other then explicatives.

Feeling Blue?

Today is probably going to be a good day, after a night of drinking, eating good food and falling down a flight of stairs, the sun is shining and the kids are happy. It's been hard lately, rain has doused the New England country side for 3 of the 4 summer months, mildew is in the basements, turning into living creatures, tomatoes rotting in the garden of weeds and hay is left for the deer to eat. After a very depressing summer I can already see the leaves turning their shades of colors and am not prepared for what seems to be fall. I can see a clearing in the clouds and watch my children ages 4y and 20 months fascinate themselves with the slugs that have overrun the lawn/garden/driveway. It has come to my attention, that I need a break, a break from the 4 jobs I fill my crazy life with, a break from the poisons of alcohol, and a break from the facade I live in. I am grateful for those who support me, love me and most importantly have patience with me. It is going to be a good day.