Princess

Only a few days ago, we nearly lost Princess.

When she was a baby, she was the one chicken out of the dozen that our six-year-old daughter decided to love. Brittany would chase Princess until she caught her, then carry her closely as they exchanged clucks. She loved that little ball of yellow. It was a Golden Sex Link, a type of chicken that is sexed by color at hatching. The girls are yellow; the boys are black. Our baby was yellow, so our daughter named our for-sure-hen "Princess."

When Princess was three months old, she started showing off a very pretty "top hat," a bright red "comb" and under her chin was a pretty red "wattle." She also kept growing past the size of the other 11 chickens. She grew so fast that soon she was twice the size of the others. We just figured that Brittany was just feeding Princess better than the others.

But one day Princess crowed.

We tried calling him "Prince," but as our Brittany says, "Princess is just stuck in our heads!" Princess, the name, has stayed with our drag-queen chicken, even as he crows and struts and protects his hens. The protecting is what got him into trouble the other day.

Our nearest neighbor has a dog that has a split personality. A week will go by without Jaffe coming to visit our animals, then one day a chick will squawk and we'll see Jaffe dashing off with her in his mouth. But he usually never messes with Princess' hens, who keep themselves separate from the new chicks.

The other day, though, Jaffe became interested in one of our juicy-looking hens and started after her. Princess successfully protected his girl, and for his trouble he got his comb torn and became so ill that we thought we'd lose him.

When I found Princess, he was laying sideways on the ground, bleeding at his comb, eyes closed, and breathing heavily with his mouth opened. I knew he only had moments to live. For a while, I just held him alone, but then I decided that Brittany, who is almost 8 now, should be there to say "goodbye" to her old friend.

We shed just a tear ... or two, I'm not admitting to much... and we prayed - not for his healing, but that God would be in control. We placed Princess in a box in the garage to rest in peace as he was heading off to Rest In Peace.

Hours later, Princess had not died yet, so Brittany and I decided that he'd probably be more happy dying among his hens than alone in the garage. We put him out on the grass where his girls surrounded him, expecting never to see him alive again. He couldn't walk or hold his head up, but we could hear him clucking at his girls.

Today, a few days later, Princess is standing taller than ever, his tail feathers are back up, his strut in full motion, and his comb upright.

We are so glad to have him back.

We are especially glad to have a God who cares about silly things like a rooster named Princess.