Author Archives: Becky Bean

A Bald Eagle is Eatin’ the Chickens

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Edit:  This was supposed to post yesterday, but apparently you are supposed to pay for your website URL, every year, or they shut it down. Whoops.

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Facebook just reminded me of something.  On this day, back in 2009, I had just passed the LAPD physical…. not by the skin of my teeth, but by the literal skin of my face.

It was an accident that should never have happened.  I shouldn’t have started the application process to become a police officer as soon as I had – the DragonMonkey was only 6 months old, and because of my C-section I’d had to wait two months to even begin any real exercise.  I’d been hitting it hard – getting up early in the morning to run, attending CAP physical fitness programs a couple of times a week….

Still – I knew I wasn’t quite ready.  It’s just….  thought I could force myself through it.  After all, it was a numbers game.  You had to pass the physical portion of testing to even begin backgrounds, and backgrounds at the LAPD took a notoriously long time, sometimes up to a year.  Plus, there was no telling when the next academy would even be, even if I was accepted. A best case scenario would give me an additional 6 months to whip myself into shape.  A more realistic timeline would give me 9-12 months… maybe even closer to a year and a half.   I figured if I could just push through the easy treadmill portion I could continue with my fitness regime and by the time I was through backgrounds and accepted into the next academy, I’d be physically ready as well.

The test was harder than I thought it was going to be.  The treadmill was narrow and had no handrails, which made me feel surprisingly dizzy – I am not afraid of heights, but something about the lack of handrails gave me an odd sense of vertigo.  The test itself wasn’t very long.  They had it timed just right to simulate the effect of running 3 miles at a 9 min/mile pace, starting off at a walk and slowly increasing inclination and speed until the final minute was spent at a near sprint at 45 degrees of inclination.

Still, I figured I could do anything for 10 minutes, and I was right.  I passed, and the treadmill turned off…. And in that instant I stepped wrong, tripped, stumbled, and my legs fell out from underneath me.

Falling on that treadmill was like one of those viral videos.  I pitched forward, and then in a last-ditch effort not to fall flat on my face I threw myself backwards, and I ended up falling on my side.  The treadmill was still booking along at a pretty good pace, so it immediately flung me backwards into the wall behind it, where I crumpled, wedged into the space between the treadmill and the wall.  I lay there, panting for breath, my chin bouncing on the still-running belt, scraping the skin off of it.

By the time I managed to pry myself out of there I was too horrified to accept a Band-Aid. Not only did I not want to draw attention to it the stupidity of my injury with a giant Band-Aid (I didn’t realize the injury was as visible as it was), but I also didn’t want to give the person any time to reconsider handing me the “passed” certificate.  I thanked him and grabbed that certificate and went to get changed for the next portion – the questionnaire.

Eleanor Roosevelt may have said that no one can make you feel inferior without your consent.

You know what?

I bet you Eleanor Roosevelt never headed into police candidate testing, the only woman in a room full of chiseled young men, her chin bleeding all over a button-up lavender shirt that was snugly buttoned over too-large nursing boobies.

I threw back my shoulders and pretended I belonged, but I still felt like a poser.

Still, scraped chin or not, I was hopeful.  I could just see myself as a police officer, so clearly. I’d always been interested in law enforcement.  I’d been a part of a police and fire cadet problem in high school and had thoroughly enjoyed my time on every ride along I had during my time with 911 Dispatching. Sure, I’d left that field to go back to school to purse a degree in the medical field, but now that life, a baby, and finances had gotten in the way of that, a career in law enforcement seemed like the perfect fit.

Spoiler alert:  I totally didn’t become a police officer.  I failed on backgrounds, and by the time I could reapply, the dragon of my rheumatoid arthritis had woken back up from its slumber and made me a permanent physical D.Q.

Sometimes I still feel sad about that.  I know it would have been a very, very hard job, and I know that there’s a lot of anti-police sentiment out there right now…. But I still think I would have found it fulfilling.

But you know what?  That’s not what this post is about.

What this post is about is that on this day, back in 2009, I had one baby, lived in a one bedroom duplex in Fullerton, California, and had just passed the LAPD physical.

This morning, in 2018, I have four kids, a minivan, 3.5 horses, and live on acreage in St. Helens, Oregon. I was in the process of being mobbed by twin toddlers, trying to shrug my way into fancy little low heeled boots so I could go to my nice little office job in the city, when I heard the Bean call out in a strange voice from the bathroom:

“Becky?  Be-e-ecky?  A bald eagle’s gettin’ the chickens!”

“WHAT?”

“A bald eagle is eatin’ the chickens!”

As a mom, I’ve come to expect to hear a lot of strange stuff before 7 in the morning, but even I have to admit this was a first.

Not wasting the time it would take to look out the window and confirm, I darted out the sliding glass door, hollering for Artemis to follow me.  I could hear her claws on the hardwood floor (sorry, floor) as she leaped to obey, so I jumped out the door and bounded down the steps, trusting her to follow. If it sounds like a bad idea to bring a Labrador to a bald eagle fight, it wasn’t. I still think it would have worked.

Artemis is one of the most intelligent dogs I’ve ever owned, but she has one failing that is impossible to train out of her:  If you throw a pretend ball, she’ll chase it.

Every time.

She’ll chase it like her life depends on it – leveling out low to the ground, hind claws churning the dirt up behind her as she digs down deep with the force of her frantic run.

I’ve tried teaching her the difference since she was 4 months old, but she can’t help herself.  If you say, “Ready?”  and palm a fake ball, she’ll perk right up, and the second you “throw” it she’ll level out in a dead sprint in whatever direction that was.

I thought this might come in handy with the bald eagle.  Artemis doesn’t have a mean bone in her body, which is good –I would never be stupidly cruel enough to pit a dog against a large bird of prey, and I especially wouldn’t do anything to hurt a bald eagle.  I don’t know all the details, but I’m pretty sure they’re a nationally protected bird, and bad things happen to people who try to hurt them. I knew the bird was separated from us by a very secure 5 foot tall no climb fence.  My hope was that the sight of an angry adult human and a large 80 pound dog sprinting towards it at a dead run would be enough to make it reconsider ever coming back to this particular bit of land for its breakfast.

I headed out on the deck and down the steps, running as best as I could in my trendy little heeled boots (as in, not very well at all.) Even separated by a couple hundred feet, I could clearly see the bald eagle.  It was a full size adult, rich brown body contrasting with the snowy white of its head, flapping awkwardly around the paddock on absurdly long wings as it desperately tried to reach one of my chickens.  It would have succeeded, but every time it had almost grasped her in its talons one of the horses would thunder by in a spooked gallop, and it would have to take to the air again to avoid being trampled.  The chicken in question was the appropriately named Nugget, one of my Easter Eggers.  She was crouched down low, separated from the rest of the flock that had taken refuge beneath the horse shelter. I don’t know how, but she had somehow managed to squeeze herself between the fence and the water trough , making it nearly impossible for the eagle to reach through and grab her with its talons.

“Scat!  Scat!  ARTEMIS, WHERE ARE YOU?  COME?”

From back in the house, I heard one of the boys, “Mom, she’s inside!”

“What?  Artemis COME!”  Where was my dog?  I needed her to be sprinting at the eagle to truly scare it.  The sight of me slowly lumbering after it, with my pear-shaped hips and tottery heels was not exactly fear-inducing.

“MOM!  She’s not outside!  We got her!  She’s inside!”

And that’s when I realized they thought she’d run off, and that I was running off to try and catch her. They saw her coming out the door after me and had stopped her, locking her inside the living room. “NOOOO.  I need her!  Let her come out!”

“What?”

“Let her outside!”

“What?”

“ARTEMIS, COME!  ARTEMIS, READY?  ARTEMIS, GO GET IT!”

“Mom, we got her! Mom, she’s inside!”

“LET HER OUT!”

“What?”

By this time I was only about 50 feet away, and close enough to the eagle that it finally decided to give up.  It gave me a somewhat disgusted look. “That was MY breakfast, not YOURS.  RUDE,” before launching into the air.  Its wing span, its body, its everything… was huge.  HUGE.

Aren’t they huge? http://trapfreemt.org/media/bald-eagle-release-headwaters-state-park

It’s one thing to know that bald eagles are big, and to admire them soaring in the sky above you.  It’s one of the things about Oregon I’ll never grow tired of.

It’s quite another thing to be about 15 feet away from one, waving your arms and saying, “SCAT!  SHOO!  You leave my chickens alone!  Just…. Just SCAT!” and realize that if it didn’t feel like moving, there really wouldn’t be too much you could do to change its mind.

Bald eagle caught on hunter webcam

Luckily it did take flight.  Its wingspan was so large it looked awkward those first few beats off the ground as it tried to dodge the horses, but after a beat or two it levelled out and was out of sight surprisingly fast.

I’m hoping we can get the materials to cobble together a chicken tractor before it returns. Our hopes were to build a really big chicken coop this summer, but with all the nesting eagles in this area doing double time to feed their young, I don’t think the chickens are going to last that long.

Still.

I am definitely not in California anymore.

The lower pasture is so pretty. It would look much prettier fenced with electric tape and horses grazing in it – one day. One day.

 

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Four.

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I’d be lonely, if I weren’t so busy.

I have at least three blog post drafts that start off with this line, which I feel is a really excellent way to sum up how the past few months of my life have gone.

The problem is that I start writing to catch everyone up on what I’ve been doing, and the next thing you know it has turned into a maudlin LiveJournal post, circa early 2000s. It’s not that I mind that type of writing. It’s more…. it’s not really how I wanted my post to be.

Besides, it’s not like anything complain-worthy as even happened to me. I think the only hard thing is that back in December the Bean and I took a look at our finances and how much his job was charging us for insurance for our family of 6 and realized that the time had finally come. I needed to get a full-time job.

I’m not gonna lie – it wasn’t an easy decision. The twins weren’t even two years old yet, and to be honest, I’ve really been enjoying parenting them. They’re so laid back and easy to get along with….either I’m getting more relaxed at this parenting gig. Maybe third and fourth time is the charm?

Also, in order to get a full-time job it meant I had to leave my dream job: the library. If you don’t know why that was so hard for me, then you haven’t been reading this blog very long. I’m pretty sure if you cut me open, fiction books and pictures of pretty horses is all that would fall out.

Suffice it to say, I just really, really, really liked working at the library.

Before you feel too sorry for me, let me jump ahead to the punchline: I got the exact job I wanted (pretty much the only one I wanted, aside from a job getting paid to read books while hanging out in a barn): Front desk person at City Hall. The hours are great, the benefits are wonderful, my coworkers are fantastic, and I’m still part of the library family, so to speak.

I mean, there’s just no way to feel properly sad about something like that.

Unfortunately, even if it went as smoothly as possible, it has still been difficult. I started my job right at the beginning of The Bean’s busy season, which means that while his paycheck is around, I only glimpse him occasionally (usually after most of the kids have gone to bed). It also didn’t help that this has been an absolutely rotten flu season. Trying to juggle a new job with four kids who seem determined to pass around the same illness, over and over, has been demanding.

Oh, what the heck am I saying?

Trying to juggle a full-time job with four kids, forget adding any of the rest of it, has been demanding. Sometimes it feels like every single hour has already ben scheduled. I’m turning into one of those people. I have a calendar now, and I schedule things on it.

I know. Gross.

Anyways, with this new schedule, although my weekends are free, I tend to spend those catching up with the kids. It really doesn’t leave a lot of time for socializing, All the children’s meetups that people schedule are during the day. There’s no time to meet up during the week. Weekends seem to be about playing catch up.

I used to rely on social media to fill my friend gap, but lately….

I’m sorry, but there’s just only so much screaming I can take. More often than not, it feels like all Facebook can do is either scream about its opinions, or drag out whatever roadkill of a travesty has happened in the news the past week and obsess over it an unhealthy amount until a new piece of roadkill is found.

Rumor has it that there are happier, less angry social media places to be, but I can’t bring myself to look into it. I like Facebook. I’m comfortable there.

Besides, while I can be awkward with people…

…the idea of researching new social media apps just to have friends is kind of depressing in and of itself.

I still keep up with a few people, but for the most part I’ve been reading, caring for my giant brood of children and animals, and daydreaming about horses.

Speaking of horses:

Did you know I have three of them in my backyard?

I know, I know.

Caspian is doing well – fat, happy, and enjoying living the life of a horse who gets to hang out with horse friends and rarely be ridden.

Honestly, it looks relaxing. I’m kind of jealous.

Back in early summer of last year I picked up a friend for Caspian, who desperately needed one. He spent all day pacing, stall weaving-nervously in a 100×50 paddock, nervously scanning the horizon as he fretted.

He was one set of opposable thumbs and an axe from turning into Jack Nicholson.

via GIPHY

It was unhealthy for him and depressing for me to look out my window and see that, so I began visiting auctions and looking on Craigslist. I stumbled onto Jupiter, a scrawny, wormy, too-thin yearling with some of the worst hooves my farrier had ever seen. Watching her trim him that first time was so gratifying – old abscesses oozing out, curled up toes getting straightened as she trimmed him back.

To be honest, I was really concerned that it might leave some kind of lasting damage, they looked so bad. (SPOILER: he has the best hooves of all of my herd, and hasn’t been lame yet, KNOCK ON WOOD.)

He fit the slot perfectly – someone to keep Caspian from spiraling further into horsey insanity by himself on my property, young enough to give me a chance to work with a young horse and teach them ground manners, lunging, etc, and pretty enough that when the time came, I might not have too hard of a time finding him a new home.

Ten Month Before/After

All was doing well, until February, when I stumbled on a pony: Carrots. I found her on while doing my weekly Craigslist scrolling (surely I’m not the only one that drools over horses I never plan on buying?) Something about her face just called to me, even if she lived an hour away. I called up the owner and asked if I could go meet her, drawn to her on a strange impulse….

But, unfortunately, someone else got there first.

I shrugged, and decided it wasn’t meant to be, and went back to work the following Monday….

Where one of my new coworkers came up to me. As it turns out, she lives only a mile from me. had seen that I had posted on Facebook about Carrots, and was willing to sell her to me for the original price.

A week later I had the pony in my backyard.

One month Before/After (before on bottom)

She was thin and wormy, but so friendly, and a much prettier mover than I expected.

To be honest, three horses was always my goal, so impulse the buying wasn’t a problem in terms of that. I have the space for them, I have the funds to care for them right and by the end of next summer I will have finished fencing in most of the lower pasture.

Three horses is not the problem. It’s four horses that’s a problem.

Yeah. Four horses.

Rewind your clocks more than a year…. all the way back to February 2017. We had lived in the house less than a month. Caspian was still being boarded at a barn, the twins were just under a year old, the walls of the new house were lined with boxes, and DragonMonkey and Squid were watching TV in the living room.

I was washing dishes, staring out the window and daydreaming about how amazing it was going to be to finally have the paddock finished and Caspian out there, grazing, in my own backyard…….. when the Bean approached. .

He stood there staring at me, holding Finn on his hip, a silent, waiting presence.

I looked up.

He opened his mouth, closed it, and then smiled jovially. “So…. so, before you get mad….”

I turned off the water, grabbing a dish towel to dry my hands and turned to give him my full attention. “Oh, Lord.”

“No, no, it’s not… it’s not a bad thing, per se. I just… I just wanted to let you know, ahead of time, because that way we could always communicate with each other effectively, and I –”

“Bean, just spit it out.”

“There’s a motorcycle.”

He stood there, almost vibrating with excitement, and I couldn’t figure out how to respond. He was obviously, so, so, so excited. If you’ve ever met the Bean, you know he doesn’t get to that point very often. He also doesn’t do things on a whim, like I do. His daydreams consist of researching. If he was standing there in front of me with excitement oozing off of him so palpably, that meant he’d not only found a motorcycle, but he’d done price-comparisons, and probably dealership visits, and test rides, and….

And he was a CPA. If he knew we could fold it into our budget, then we could probably make it happen. So I had two choices:

I could put the kabosh on the whole thing, and feel like I was ripping the wings off a butterfly…..

Or I could say yes.

It was just…. He already had a motorcycle that he rode to work, every day, and I found myself getting jealous on the inside. I knew whatever motorcycle he wanted to bring home was not a practical one – it was going to be loud, and fast, and the kind of thing that served no practical purpose other than making his heart happy.

It wasn’t that I didn’t want him to be happy, it was just that I was envious. I know. I know, that’s shallow of me, and not a good trait to have. Even though the twins were so much more amazing than I had imagined, I still felt like I had lost a piece of myself during their pregnancy and that first year of round-the-clock nursing. I didn’t have anything to look forward to – no goals, beyond maybe one day sleeping through the night again.

I looked the Bean in the eye, paused, opened my mouth, paused again, and then blurted out, “Fine. If you’re getting a motorcycle then I’m getting a baby Morgan horse. From that Scandia Morgan place.”

I don’t know how I expected him to respond. I was throwing it out there, almost like a giant, verbal litmus test. How much did he really want this motorcycle?

“Deal! Deal. Yes. No problem.” He nodded his head two, three times in a row, and shifted Finn higher on his hip. “That’s fair.” He nodded again, paused, and then said with a grin creeping across his face. “Want to hear about the motorcycle?”

And now you know why I’m sitting here, more than a year later, checking my Facebook messenger frequently for updates, waiting to see if Sparkle (real name: Marvelous by Design) has finally foaled yet.

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