Three Chicken Necks…Extra Crispy…Please…

A friend of mine…asked me yesterday…why I get up so early…and…I gave my standard answers…habit…body clock…morning person…leave for work early…crazy woman…but…she wasn’t satisfied…she kept pressing…but why do you really get up so early…and…yes…three to four o’clock is early…even by my standards…

In my defense…I don’t get up that early…unless I’m working…and…I know…that still doesn’t explain the crazy woman part…but…I digress…

It wasn’t until later…that Bertha gave me the…real…answer…that is the only time of day…that I am just me…

I’m nobody’s mother…nobody’s daughter…nobody’s employee…nobody’s sister…nobody’s friend…mainly…because…they are all asleep…and don’t want to be bothered…I’m just me…

I thought about that for a while…and…it’s true…that’s the only time…that I can pretty much be assured that I won’t be interrupted…that no one will make demands on me…early morning is my time…and…no one seems to want to take it away from me…

I thought that was that for the…ah ha moments…but…Bertha wanted to play connect the dots…which by the way…in no way…resembles…the activity we did as kids…as…you might imagine…although…maybe…as I think about it…it does…some of those patterns were pretty…obscure…a lot like Bertha’s…but…I’m digressing even more…

So…Bertha and her dots…started to connect to a memory…of…Granny Turner…who always ate the backs and necks…when she fried chicken…as a child…going for a drumstick…or a breast…I always thought that was strange…why did she choose those pieces…when the other pieces were better…

The answer…was a little convoluted…those were the pieces that no one else wanted…so…with a large family…if she chose those pieces…she was assured of getting them…no one was going to take them away…whine or fuss…they were hers…she may have eaten the wings…too…as…that was before the buffalos took them over…and…they became popular…back then…they were just a whole lot of work for a little bit of meat…but I digress…yet again…and you know what they say…three digresses…and…you are way off track…

Back on track…Bertha…says…that’s just the way it is in life…we all want something that is just ours…that nobody’s gonna take away from us…whether it’s two hours in the morning…or…a chicken neck…it really doesn’t matter…as long as it’s yours and you can count on it…

Hmmm…she’s right…of course…but…if it’s all the same…I think I’ll stick with my morning hours…and…let her have the chicken necks…

Yeah…I’m generous…that way…what can I say…

Jane