Cruising along

Friday morning was full of escapes. I was baking a wedding cake when I heard Lumi whinging at the top of her lungs, looked out the window to see Greta standing in front of the shed. This was not ideal since I was home alone. Greta does not permit touching, and she is fast. Whenever I'd lift up the mesh to try and coax Greta back in Lumi would crawl out through the gap and then I'd have two chickens to chase. After much Benny Hill-ing I got them both back in. Then Lumi decided it was time to lay. Can't lay in the coop, oh no no no. So she was under the back mesh and behind the coop in seconds. That was great. I put them all into the coop until she laid to solve the problem. She can be a little high maintenance.

We had our first weekend away from the girls last weekend, it was weird not spending time with them. Luckily this week I've been finishing work early & starting late on a variety of days which has increased the amount of time I can spend with them to make up for it.

This morning I had a whole extra hour before going to work, so I took some strawberries out to Greta (the other two don't like them). However, they were all far more interested in my white nail polish. Lumi was quite convinced it was some sort of tasty treat and was all over my lap trying to bite my nails. Even Harriet jumped up next to me to have a look. Greta however, after an initial look-see, just wanted the strawberries. She doesn't seem to radiate so much indifference these days, perhaps about the same amount as Harriet.

"Screw your chicken selfie, those nails are fabulous"

However, Lumi actually likes us now! The Greed is strong in that one. She trails around behind us all over the enclosure & coop, runs over to the fence when we walk out the door to visit them, and trails us to the fence when we leave the enclosure. One of my favourite new behavioural traits is when I bring the clean water container into the enclosure she runs over and stands on my feet in order to drink from the dish. I don't even know how to process so much cute.

It's been really nice forging new friendships with Lumi, Harriet & Greta. It's hard work, and we still have a long, long way to go with the latter two, but it'll be worth it.

A few times over the weekend I thought 'I miss the chickens', and then I realised that seemed silly considering 'missing' these girls must equal about 1% of the feeling of how much I miss Agnes & Ripley every single day. There are no words to describe how much I still miss them, an anguished howl of pure pain (like in movies) would probably be close to expressing how I feel, even after 6.5 months.

"Inside? Yes that is where I should be"

 Looking at this healing process in an objective way has been interesting. I'm actually able to look through the old photos and remember all the hilarious & cute times that I snapped pictures of with laughter, not tears (mostly). I'm glad we have the new girls, but they're not helping in any way that I initially expected. They're not filling the gaping hole in my heart, and I'm starting to realise that nothing ever will, and that's ok, I believe that might even be normal. Eventually they'll forge their way into what remains :). They don't provide the comfort I seek for the loss of A&R, however, they do provide comfort from general daily woes and upsets, and I enjoy spending time with them because of who they are, not because I'm trying to replace lost activities.

"This diagonal surface is most comfortable for a nap"

I miss their little faces so much.