It’s a dog-eat-chicken world out there

Southern humor and storytelling, read by the author

(This story is dedicated to Barkley, may he rest in peace. He was a good dog, and he never really ate any chickens, but I do think he witnessed some things as the lookout guy.)

“Pop, there are some good dogs out there, the kind of dogs that go to heaven one day, but that dog ain’t one of them.”

I said those prophetic words to my father the day he rescued the troublesome stray from the animal shelter—paroled would be a better word—but little did I know the full extent of the trouble ahead. The dog in question was now firmly detained inside a cage in the back of Dad’s pickup as we drove to deal with his latest crimes.

“I needed a good guard dog, and he keeps the foxes, coyotes and burglars away,” Pop had said that day in the dog’s defense, even as the mutt was gnawing up a good electrical cord, urinating on my tires and looking for a garden hose to eat.

“He also keeps away the delivery man, the mail lady, and the Girl Scouts selling cookies,” I had retorted.

Butch came into our lives rather abruptly, kind of like an ominous growth that suddenly appears on your backside, and I was itching to have him removed. Unfortunately, Pop was a lover of almost all animals. Any stray that showed up on his farm got a cot and three square meals a day, no background check needed, no questions asked. He even liked cats, that’s how bad it was.

Of course, my dog and family pet, Barkley, took up with Butch right way. He was always one to succumb to peer pressure and follow the wrong crowd. Soon, Butch had Barkley out all hours of the night, chasing skirts and cars, and hanging out with a pack of other unsavory felons. Before we knew it, all the unprotected maidens along Speed Limit Road became “great with pup.” Phone calls began pouring in from the owners of the dishonored lady dogs, demanding child support from the tramp or his owner.

Then the killings started.

(For those of you who don’t know the frontier code of rural South Carolina, there is no mercy for a varmint that dares kill and eat a live chicken or farm-fresh eggs.)

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