The chickens of Manhattan Beach
Pier Plaza reflection by Joe Carson. Honorable mention
by Denise Kano
My dad did not want chickens. We lived inManhattan Beach, within walking distance of the Safeway. This, to him, seemed like a reasonable enough place to get our eggs.
However, for Father’s Day, 1974, he was given six tiny, fluffy, baby chicks from our mom. Reluctantly, he built a large chicken coop with the help of my 11-year-old brother. Although our dad was not known for his woodworking skills, the coop was impressive and stood tall in our backyard. After assisting with coop construction, my brother’s main interest in the chickens was tossing a Frisbee at their coop and watching the chickens frantically run in circles. This continued daily despite my mom’s pleas that the chickens would be too traumatized to produce any eggs if he continued his new found hobby.
At 13, I didn’t care much about chickens. I didn’t care about feeding them, or cleaning up after them, or especially for how ridiculously noisy they were. All I wanted to do that summer was ride my 10-speed to22nd Streetin Hermosa with my friends. We pooled our change to buy candy at the Green Store and spent the rest of the day lying on our beach towels eating junk food, listening to KHJ on a transistor radio, and playing cards.
Among our group of friends, Michelle was the more advanced. She had long, brown hair, an even tan, and was the first one of us girls to wear a macramé string bikini. She struck poses on her beach towel while the rest of us wore Hang Ten tee shirts over our bikini tops. She talked about things like spin the bottle and openly flirted with boys, while we read Tiger Beat and dreamed about Bobby Sherman.
After a long day at the beach, we’d ride back to my house and listen to music on the jukebox while playing pool. But even turning up the music did not drown out the constant clucking of the chickens, so inevitably the topic would turn to fowl.
“Why did the chicken cross the road?” asked Ron.
“Yeah, yeah, real original,” said Jerry, the boy I had a crush on during two years of junior high.
I resented being the only family that I knew of inManhattan Beachwith chickens roosting in the backyard. Yes, we lived east of Sepulveda, but still, I didn’t think this area should be considered farmland. What was next: baby goats? But after the chickens started regularly laying eggs, I started to like the idea a little bit. Each chicken laid at least two brown eggs per day, and our refrigerator was soon overflowing. Mom started giving them away. Neighbors saved their empty egg cartons and were given fresh eggs in return. We had an upcoming vacation, and my best friend and I held a fresh egg sale in the front yard in order to help fund her joining us on our family trip.
But the hands-down best part of having chickens was the generous amount of ready ammunition available for egging someone’s house. This was typically directed toward someone you didn’t like, had a crush on, or if you just wanted a little pitching exercise. It made an instant soggy mess, and if the eggs weren’t cleaned up immediately, the substance hardened and it took extra cleaning effort, usually with plenty of expletives.
Jerry was still my crush. So when he asked if I could provide him with as many eggs as possible, I didn’t ask any questions. I smuggled enough eggs to him to cover a small portion of the Manhattan Beach Pier.
The next day Mom and I were on our way to Fedco, which meant driving by Michelle’s house. Mom almost brought the car to a complete stop when she saw Michelle’s front lawn. Broken, brown eggshells were strewn all over the grass.
“Look at all those lovely eggs, wasted. That’s going to take days to clean up,” she said.
As the car lurched forward, I spotted two familiar figures on the side of the house. There stood Michelle and Jerry, holding hands.
“You wouldn’t happen to know anything about this, would you?” asked mom.
I slid down in my seat, crushed.
“No, mom. I don’t know anything about those eggs.”
I’m not sure she bought it. I managed to avoid Jerry for the remainder of the summer, and I never looked at egging in quite the same way after that.
When the chickens no longer laid eggs, we were told they had been given away. It was several years later that we found out the truth. Our Irish immigrant grandparents had taken care of the chickens the old country way. Grandpa killed them, grandma plucked them, and together they enjoyed a first-class chicken dinner.
I have tried to convince my husband of the benefits of having chickens in our own backyard. After all, we do live east of Sepulveda, and we also have two young boys who would be great coop-building assistants. I’ve even considered just surprising him with his own group of small chicks.
“Imagine — fresh eggs every morning!” I say.
“The grocery store’s across the street,” he replies. “I’m good with that.”