A Generous Greeting, and Hopefully an Inspiration

Out with the dogs for their pre-dawn constitutional I could tell, even in the darkness, that the day would have more shivers than the forecast had predicted.  

As it turned out, I hadn't even begun to anticipate them. 

Damp -- more of a chilly presence than measurable precipitation -- I pulled my jacket closer to me until I could hurry the pups back inside.  I was hoping for a more temperate welcome since the Buff Orpingtons were supposed to arrive by express mail from Texas sometime today.  I was still scanning through the morning news when my phone rang.  At 6:55 a.m. it was the Post Office announcing a clucking arrival.  I had plans for the day, but birds in a box take precedent over a conference in a classroom.  I was waiting when the Postal Pickup Window opened.

Thinking back, though one of the two birds popped right out, the other hung back when I opened the box inside the coop annex and had to be encouraged out into the bedding.  They both seemed healthy enough; I chalked up the reticence to stiff muscles from cramped travel, and the chilly new environment.  I retrieved the shipping box, latched the door, and headed for the dumpster -- my mind already shifted to the conference at which I would now be arriving late.  Lifting the lid and hoisting the box I suddenly froze.  Amidst the bedding material and the remnants of the apple slice that served as traveling food I noticed something else.

An object.

Brown.

Oblong.

Almost like an egg.

"Why," I wondered to myself, "would they send the hen with an artificial egg?"  I have wooden ones inside the nesting boxes to help educate the hens what those boxes are designed for (so far, to empty result) but I couldn't fathom their purpose with shipping.

And then it hit me:  it isn't artificial.  It isn't "like" an egg; it's an EGG.  The ones we've had for two weeks now have not been forthcoming, but this new one presents a gift upon her arrival.

How courteous! 

I will let the new young ladies get settled in before introducing to the rest of the flock.  After all, travel can be a headache.  They have much to get used to -- a new house, a new run, to say nothing of the weather's damp chill.  But in a couple of days I'll push their protective run alongside the others where, with any luck, they can teach the older ones a thing or two about manners.

And eggs.