USA: Murder in the chicken shack

Email from America 3: the rural dream, and bloodstained reality

A decade ago, our second son had just been born and I was settling quietly into middle age. My wife had other ideas, and decided that we should move to the country. We bought 9 acres with a house and a barn, our own well and sewage system, and neighbours who leave us in peace. We cut our own wood for winter heat, breed goats for meat and milk … and raise chickens.

It started innocently enough with a call from the main post office on a Saturday afternoon, letting us know that we could pick up a package of live animals. What we got was a small cardboard box, stuffed with 50 fluffy chicks. We cooed over them, moved my car out, and installed them with a heat lamp in the garage. Within a month, they had some real feathers, and looked like badly-dressed inner-city schoolboys. One more month, and they were fully-fledged chavs – pushing, pecking, shoving, and occasionally killing each other.

They were so nasty that I didn’t feel really guilty when we drove them to the processor. They returned neatly wrapped and ready for the freezer, costing only 2-3 times what our local supermarket would charge. But they tasted better, or so we told ourselves.

We are now 8 years into our hobby, and have learned a lot. For example, give a rooster 10 hens, and he will hump and torment all of them. Put 20 hens with two roosters, and the dominant one will fight the other for all of them. It isn’t just the males. Remove all roosters, and one hen will take over, like a bad lesbian prison movie. It is distressingly human.

With selective breeding, we now have roosters who will defend their hens, but (usually) not attack people. In our microcosm of social engineering experiments, that may be the best that we can do. At the very least, it has given our children an appreciation for the convenience of grocery stores, and survival skills that rival those of an Eagle Scout.

Tim is a math professor in Ohio.

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USA: Taking the Oath

Email from America: 2

The article below was first published in the pages of the Record Courier of Ravenna, Ohio.

 

Why I became an American

Last Friday [April 18, 2008], after nearly 30 years as a British ex-patriate working in the USA, I became an American citizen.

You may wonder why it took me so long. My wife says it’s because I hate change; I like to think it’s because I want to make the right decision.

I thought about it seriously, because it’s saying goodbye as well as hello. I had to swear in front of a Federal judge that my father’s birthplace and my mother’s adopted country would no longer be ‘home’.

But thanks to my friends and family, I realize that this is the best ‘home’ I’ve ever had. Americans value the individual, even when his views, like mine, are unorthodox. Here, in my homestead in Northeast Ohio, surrounded by my friends and family, I fit in better than I ever did while growing up. And now, I belong.

There are things I miss about England, of course, but most of them are just memories: quiet pubs that served ‘warm’ beer; fish and chips wrapped in newspaper; the selective university system that gave me a great education. Now, those pubs and chip shops have become noisy night clubs and McDonalds, and as for college, I remember how brutal it was for those who couldn’t succeed immediately. Here in America, the system gives you a second chance.

Most of all, I miss the English bloody-mindedness, the determination to push back against stupid rules; but that is also mostly gone. As the British government tightens restrictions on personal freedom, few people protest, and the mechanisms to fight back just aren’t there. As my brother frequently reminds me, we in the U.S. have a written Constitution, and a legal system willing to support it and challenge the government on our behalf. In fact, we have the best of the English tradition right here, alive and feisty.

Now that I’m an American, I will have to make some changes. I can’t say ‘you Americans’ any more; though I refuse to delete the ‘u’ in ‘colour’, or to stop pronouncing ‘garage’ the way I do. But I can still weigh in pounds and ounces, pump gas in gallons and measure height in feet and inches; which is more than my English brother can do.

And, I will finally be able to participate in that greatest of all American entertainments, a national election.

As for the future, I will always remember the Judge’s speech at our ceremony, where he quoted President Reagan: “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same”. I intend to do my best to honour that commitment.

Tim is a math professor in Ohio.

All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy.

USA: The Immigrant

Email from America: 1
 

This series of pieces is a humble homage to ‘Letters from America’ by the late, great Alistair Cooke, who took the Oath of Allegiance in 1941 and whose life’s mission thereafter was to present the American experience to the rest of the world.

I first visited the US in December 1977, and moved here in June 1978. Since then I have lived in Northern Ohio, part of what is called the ‘Midwest’. Looking at a map will go a long way to explaining our local thinking.  But Ohio is by many measures a very average state, which explains the media’s interest in us only every four years, during the national elections. What we see here is as average  'American' as it gets.

Much of my free time has been spent trying to understand this society, and after 35 years it’s still a work in progress. It’s not a coincidence that a leading satirical website is called The Onion, because our culture has many layers, and will bring tears to the eyes.

For all that, like Cooke and millions of other newcomers, I’ve made it my country. To the often ill-concealed pleasure of our national enemies and allies, we’re expert at flaunting our faults and divisions. I shall explore these in future posts, but I also hope to show you some of the virtues that our critics seem more reluctant to learn.

Tim is an English-born math professor and lecturer on gambling strategies.

All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy.