This is a self portrait. It's me, wearing my favorite black and grey striped cardigan. I call it my Tim Burton cardigan because when I wear it, I feel like I'm in a Tim Burton movie...

Just Me

So, what did you think?  Strange? Sad? Weird? Depressing?  Well, luckily, it doesn't matter what you thought as long as you thought something.  Reaction... that's what makes it art, you see.  Yes, I know, this entire blog is a bit eccentric, but that's okay.  I'm eccentric and I have no problem sharing my eccentricities with you.  Now, what I really am writing to say is that I do have more posts coming up.  They involve roadkill, kittens, and emotional scarring on my part. However, I am much too tired at the moment to type them up, so they will be posted whenever I jolly well feel like posting them.  That is all. 

Mother Hen

My parents were gone for the week, so the animals had become solely my responsibility.  Juggling two cumbersome calf bottles, I trudged through the deep, smelly mud of the pasture and into the barn with my younger sister at my heels.  The calves, one grey and one black, ran to us and began to down the warm milk with too much gusto for such a hot day.  I loved the calves, but feeding them tended to be annoying since their sticky slobber usually got all over my hands and arms.  After the calves had their fill, my sister and I turned our attention to the chickens.  There were to large, square cages in one of the horse stalls.  Each was about chest deep and one arm's length in width.  One held a hen and three lively, little chicks that ran around pecking at the flies that flew about them.  I could see a hen in the other cage, but she was sitting on her nest.  I could see but one chick with her, although my father had told me he placed two others in the cage on the previous day.  As I approached the cage, the hen stood and began to run in circles, stirring up the straw that littered the floor.  What I saw horrified me.  The other two chicks were dead.  One was still in the nest while the other was beside the nest.  They had not been hatched long when they died because their damp feathers still clung closely to their little bodies.  My stomach turned as the mother hen and her living offspring trampled carelessly over the dead babies as if they were not nor had ever been anything at all.  I knew I had to do something about the deceased chicks, so I turned to my sister who stared sadly back at me.  I stepped into the tack room and found a pair of gloves.  As my sister held back the hen, I reached in and picked up the chick that lay beside the nest.  Cradling it gently in my gloved hand, I walked out of the barn and into the pasture.  My father had warned me that I might encounter this particular situation and had told me what to do with "the dead ones." His method of disposal seemed so heartless... so cruel.  But I didn't know what else to do.  Burying the poor things wasn't an option.  My family would make fun of me mercilessly for that.  "It's just a stupid chicken," they would say, "it doesn't matter."  It matters to me.  I looked down at the lifeless creature in my hand.  I felt tears beginning to sting my eyes, but I pushed them back, remembering the looks of disapproval my family would give me.  I had to do as I was told.  Mustering my courage, if that's what it's even called, I drew back my arm and flung the pitiful carcass across the pasture.  I watched as its limp little body bounced against the soft ground.  I literally choked at the sight.  I felt so cruel.  In a shocked daze, I returned to the barn to get the second dead chick.  This time, as soon as I launched its body into the air, I turned around.  I could not bring myself to watch this one hit the ground too.  After a second, my sister came outside of the barn and we went back to the house.  That was it.  I know now that I should have gone with my first feelings and buried the poor things.  At least then I would have felt better about it and the memory of it would not still be with me.

Introduction

Hello.  I am the Beguiling Barn Owl.  Yes, I like owls.  Before you look at the name of the blog and have negative thoughts, allow me to explain a few things.  I am not writing this blog to be depressing and what not.  I am writing it for my own benefit and posting it in the hopes that someone might find it interesting in some way.  It started when I was having trouble sleeping and a friend told me that it might help to journal about what is on my mind.  I sort of ignored this advice at first because I did not think that my sleeplessness had any mental or psychological roots.  However, after thinking it over, I realized that perhaps he was right.  Maybe there were emotions deep inside me that were keeping me up; haunting me, if you will.  Thusly, I began to write about the scenarios that might have caused these emotions.  Just to warn you, most of them have to do with the death of animals, since I seem to spend a lot of time around animals.  Death is not something I take lightly.  Anyway, on to more frivolous subjects.  I will be writing these posts as they come to me.  Do not expect perfection.  My intent with these posts is to express raw emotion and attempt to give you a glimpse into the emotional workings of my brain and heart.  I may be vague at times, whether intentionally or unintentionally so.  It is my blog and I shall do as I wish.  If something is unclear or you just have a question, please feel free to ask.  Well, that's that.  Thank you ever so much for taking the time to read this.  I hope it either intrigues or entertains you in some way.