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It was my omniscience that determined yesterday to be the day the twins moved into the big coop after six weeks in the annex.  Or maybe it was the winter-chilled lethargy that had been shaving down my interest in outside tasks these last few days.  Whichever, I thought I would give it a try and see what happened.  I'll admit that its not that much extra effort to open two coops in the mornings and close them again each evening.  It doesn't really take that much time to check both sets of nesting boxes for eggs each afternoon, but after a month's worth of enforced segregation and two weeks of daytime inter-play, it seemed reasonable to think that the girls would all be well enough acquainted to share a common roost.  That, and the onset of winter, plus forecasted nighttime temperatures plunging below the teens of recent darknesses into the single-digits starting tonight, made me suspicion that the girls might welcome every extra degree of body heat they could capture in their space. 

So, yesterday afternoon I closed up the annex while everyone in the yard was otherwise occupied.  As dusk began to tuck the beaks and droop the eyelids, eleven sets of feet trooped up the ramp and settled in for the night.  The twins padded across the straw I had scattered over the snow toward their familiar slumbers. 

And pulled up short.  Somethings was amiss. 

Access thwarted via their usual entrance, they bobbed around to the far side. 

Nothing.

In tandem they reapproached the door, and stared at it, as if force of will could raise it.

Nothing.

Again they circled to the far side, around the back, and again approached the front -- sneaking up on it, perhaps, as though it might be playing a trick. 

Still closed.

After yet another circuit around, both jumped atop the hay bale positioned as a windbreak nearby, and then up upon the roost as if a different angle of vision might reveal some access they had missed. 

Alas.

Having run out of options, and after one final circle around, the two adolescent Light Brahmas began the long march across the straw toward the Big House. 

The Trail of Tears.

Slowly they moved, as if every step was a labor, until reaching the half-way point they stopped.  It was as if something deep inside of them suddenly and simultaneously comprehended that they simply couldn't do it.  Without so much as a cluck or a sideward glance, they turned together and reversed course; retreating back toward the annex -- the only space they knew or remembered to be home. 

I have no idea what inward plan they had silently hatched.  Would they have continued to circle the structure, praying like Joshua that the walls would come down?  Failing that, would they really have huddled up together against the closed door of familiarity, resolving to keep each other as warm as they could, and try their best in a cuddled embrace to ride out the night?  Would they eventually give in to despair, resign themselves to community, trek back up to the main coop and silently, chastened, slip in amongst the others?

I have no way of knowing.  That mid-course reversal and dejected retreat broke my heart and, armed again with boots, coats and gloves, I trudged back out into the yard and opened the door to their home.  I'll never know, I suppose, if their muted clucks were gratitude or scolding as they toddled past me through the opened space and settled into the familiar bedding within.  And we'll have this drama to play out again in the coming evenings.

But last night all of us slept a little more peacefully.  And if this morning's exit is any attestation, everyone stayed warm enough.