My days of keeping chickens are coming to a close. It has been an epic four plus years, with scores of birds named, hatched, bought, held, fed. Many have died, of natural causes or the circle of life. Others have thrived, and come quickly when I step outside. It feels great to have a bird fly up to your shoulder, or an entire flock at your feet even if they are only interested in the slice of bread you are about to break into pea sized pieces. 

Circumstances have converged to bring me to this decision: new regulations in my town, Benjamin's escalating struggles, readiness to try new things. I know that I have done well by my birds, lugging water in the winter, schlepping food twice a day, scooping out coops and laying fresh bedding. I was not a perfect chicken keeper, but they were safe and loved. Each flock bore names to mark the memories of our family... the Harry Potter group, the Sewing Circle, the Peanuts gang, the cabinet from West Wing. 

The morning I posted birds and coops for sale on social media I had other things to do. But mostly I kept responding to the nearly continual pinging on my phone of messages, offers, questions. 

"How old?"

"What breed?"

"Where are you located?"

I would say my phone was ringing off the hook but phones don't have hooks anymore. 

Friends I have shared this season with came with bins to carry home whole families, asking their names and what their favorite treats are. They will be taken care of. 

Transitions are inevitable, it seems. The alternative is a straight and monotonous line from start to finish. While predictability is comforting, the human heart thirsts for novelty too. I have some hopes for what might open up in the empty space created because my birds have flown... or been driven... yet there is uncertainty too.

One thing I do know. I worked hard to protect and nourish them, through storms and fox raids, blasting hot afternoons and the fragility of new life. 

That is what they taught me.