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Community Corner

Sometimes A Wild Turkey Isn't Just a Drink

My kids' lives are panning out so differently than my own. That's not a bad thing.

My dog chased a wild turkey out of my backyard this afternoon.

Read that again, slowly.  Soak it in. 

When did I get transplanted to a turkey farm?  Yes, we have robins roosting on our back porch (now joined by a family of house wrens, by the way. It’s like a duplex.), and it’s true that most of my hibiscus plants have been nibbled about by groundhogs. It’s also true that I almost turned a deer into venison steaks on my drive home the other day, when it leapt in front of my GMC Envoy (I’m calling that one an attempted suicide).

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But, a turkey? A wild turkey?

Understand that I grew up in cities. The first half of my childhood was spent in Brooklyn and the second half in Bayonne.  Basically, I could walk three blocks in any direction, for most of my life, and either get pizza or a manicure. Sometimes both.  Occasionally, a possum would come steal some of the cat food that the crazy cat lady next door left out for her feral “babies,” and that was as close to wildlife as I got.

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Now I have turkeys in my backyard.

I started thinking, as I called my dog off from this stupid bird, about the differences in my childhood and that of my children.  Aside from the wildlife, or lack thereof. There are some simple joys my kids will never know that I largely took for granted.

For example, I may have mentioned before that my house is the only one on our street.  This means we have no real “neighbors” to speak of. This means that no one knocks on our door at 9 am on a Saturday morning to see if Joey can come outside to play.

Do kids even play outside anymore?  I have to confess, I haven’t seen many lately, myself.

My friends and I were outside from right after breakfast to right before dinner, most days. And some days, we’d get to go back outside after dinner.  When I got older, I roamed the neighborhood, played in the park, took my grandfather’s dog for long, long walks. Probably much further than her little chihuahua constitution should have been handling. Maybe that’s why she ran away. Hmmm...

Anyway my point is, I do my best to approximate some of these things for my kids. You know, I kick them out of the house into the backyard right after breakfast, and then lock the door till dinner time. I shove some lunch out the window.  That type of thing.

But I’m not sure that I’m doing the experience justice. For that matter, I’m not sure I should really be mourning these things my kids will “miss out on.”

The truth is, we live in a different place, and in a different time.  There are some things that are unique to their childhood that they’ll probably be aghast to hear weren’t part of mine. 

Things like climbing a peach tree when they’re hungry, to snag a fresh peach in July.  Or watching birds build nests. No, the ice cream truck doesn’t come down our street, but we make ice cream sundaes with too much whipped cream and THREE cherries on top.  Maybe they don’t have a pool in the backyard, but they know how to have more fun with a hose and a sprinkler than I ever could have dreamed up.

They may never utter a shriek upon walking out the back door to bring the garbage out after sundown to see that possum in the crazy cat lady’s yard (although I’ve no doubt they’ll see their fair share of possums), but they get to run outside and laugh their little butts off while we watch our dog chase a turkey... and then watch the turkey chase the dog as soon as he turns his back.

Yes, it’s a different type of childhood than the one I had. But, some things are universal. Love, laughter and fun. And really, of those, all you really need is love. The laughter and fun just naturally follow.

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