The Legend Of Beelzeburkey And The Kamikaze Chickens

Turkeys are freaky scary. Have you ever seen a wild Turkey? Nearly ran me off the road while I was dodging chickens...

One of my favorite fiction authors,

Chuck Palahniuk

gave a writing prompt yesterday that I thought was hilarious and completely agree with! Turkeys are scary. I am glad turkeys get eaten; those bigger than you would expect creeps. Delicious creeps, but still creeps.

Let me explain…

This one time, I lived in rural Tennessee for about five months. It’s all I could handle concerning that town; at the time, you could put the whole town’s population into the Dallas Cowboys stadium four times. I was known about town as, “Oh yeah, that’s the queer that lives in Evelyn’s old house. He’s the only guy in town who puts AuckerNet in his hair!” But listen, don’t judge me. Aqua Net is all Walmart had on sale at the time.

Even in Shelbyville, one needs a little panache. I am sure it will catch on… It hasn’t in almost thirty years since, but I still have hope. OH, and Aqua Net is flammable. It’s the primary source of fire for the hillbilly flamethrower (don’t try it at home). I used to kill all the flies in the Stop-N-Go I worked at for a while. What else will you do at 3:30 AM while working in a Stop-n-go?

Back to the story…

I was driving down the two-lane toward Tullahoma, just north of where the sweet nectar of my people is made in Lynchburg (Jack Daniels). I was headed to a community college there for an Algebra Class. On my epic journey toward the torture known as college Algebra 1, I began to see the strangest road kill.

Chickens. One here, two there, drive a little further, one more over there, THREE in the middle of the road… I was like, WHAT the fresh kind of dead bird hell is this? Then a pterodactyl (also known as a wild turkey) came flying up off the side of the road at my car. They don’t fly, but that wingspan is the stuff of Marvel movies. It scared the snot out of me as I jerked my little blue-based red Ford Focus all over the road. Who knew creepy turkeys had wings that big? Not me. I am sure it was trying to get across the road but darted out at the wrong time. I didn’t hit it, but I nearly ran off the road, fearing that the pterodactyl would carry me to some enormous nest and eat my eyeballs first. I looked back in my rearview mirror to see this giant turkey bird traverse the blacktop. I swear it looked at me with the evil eyes of a Beelzebub. Its true nature was revealed. It was a Beelzeburkey beast!

Ok. Fine. I am overplaying that part, but it was weird, creepy even.

I kept driving, but the dead chicken count kept growing and growing. I finally caught up to a Tyson truck. They had a chicken “processing” plant near Evelyn’s house where the queer lived. The back gate door on this eighteen-wheeler full of chickens was swaying back and forth, open. The driver was unaware as these desperate chickens, on at least eight different levels of the aviary (cage), kept jumping out of the back of the truck. While playing dodgeball with live chickens hurtling at my car, I honked, honked, and finally, the truck driver started to pull over.

I did not pull over. Traumatized, I had to get to Algebra class with the fresh memories of watching dozens of chickens take a kamikaze approach to freedom and being attacked by a pterodactyl. I was cautious and aware of the not-dead Beelzeburkey “still out there” as I made my way home after barely passing another college Algebra 1 test.

So every Thanksgiving, I am reminded of that feathery nightmare. Thank you, creepy Beelzeburkeys of the world.