Chickens have been big news in Eau Claire, our nearest “big city” and shopping town. The city council has been debating whether or not to allow raising them in the city. There are strong opinions on both sides.

This week the news got so big it beat out a Supreme Court nomination and the oil spill for that valuable front-page above-the-fold placement in the daily newspaper. Daughter Anne-marie gets home delivery, and emailed us this photo before our paper arrived by snail mail.

Yes, that's me with a chicken on the front page of the May 10 Eau Claire Leader-Telegram. Since "A dog fight on Main St. is more newsworthy than a war in China," the Great Chicken Debate in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, got a better position than the Supreme Court nominee or the Gulf oil spill. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time with the right newly-published book —The Complete Idiot's Guide to Raising Chickens — to get in on the action.

The controversy depresses me, and the issue of having chickens in town is only a part of it. But that part is bad enough.

Why in the world would anyone want to outlaw the soothing clucking of a couple of hens, while yapping crapping dogs are okay? And in some places I’ve been, what about sirens, trains, airplanes, busses, garbage trucks… Come to think of it, is it humane to subject chickens to such human turmoil by raising them in an urban setting?

Why does there have to be a law about such matters? Why can’t neighbors just work it out amongst themselves, if there’s a problem?

Which there shouldn’t be, and in most cases, isn’t. (But a council member dissed anybody who says the officials are wasting their time with such nonsense. That reinforces my policy of never voting for anyone stupid enough to run for public office.)

What is even more depressing — and in a way, frightening — is that issues like these lead to the realization that some people have no idea whatsoever how the real world functions. They have no appreciation for its marvels and beauty, and more significantly, they lack the information required for making the right decisions about utilizing its resources.

Most farm or homestead people who have entertained visitors from the city have some experience with this. Kids, (and in too many cases their parents as well) think milk comes from a factory of some kind, never from a cow or goat. And I’d like to have a nickel for every kid who has watched a cow poop and said, “Yuck! I’m never drinking milk again!”

I have seen children gag, watching me make beautiful, rich, thick and delicious tomato paste with a Victorio strainer. Sure, they eat catsup on everything, but that’s different: that comes from a bottle, not a icky-squishy fresh fruit.

These people are amazed to discover that carrots grow in the ground… with dirt on them. And then there’s Archie Bunker having a fit when Edith said they were having tongue  for supper: “Tongue!? I ain’t eatin’ nuttin’ that came out of a cow’s mouth! Fry me an egg!”

The real problem intensifies when these attitudes are transferred to the wider world. Just as food comes from brightly-lit supermarkets via wonderful factories that are marvels of modern science, gasoline comes from a pump at a filling station. Water comes from a faucet when you turn it on, and electricity arrives through some kind of wiring whenever you flip a switch. It’s all too easy, too simple, too magical to even think about. It’s also predictable and guaranteed… for now.

But of course it results in a disconnect. These people begin to exist, totally and completely, in an artificial world, where the livin’ is easy. They cannot understand, and so they ignore and avoid at all costs the real world, where not all apples are perfect and where death and decay — to say nothing of manure — are hard facts of life.

Little things like being able to identify birds and weeds, watching something edible grow from a tiny dry seed, and seeing first-hand and close-up how eggs are produced, would go a long way toward making people more aware of the world they inhabit. More aware, and therefore, hopefully, more caring. By applying NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) not only to landfills, toxic waste sites and nuclear plants but also to naturalized front lawns, vegetable growing, raising chickens — and nature in general — people become more and more isolated from reality. Allowing nature and all things natural back into our artificial lives is not regressing into primitive living: it makes us more human.

I read this morning that despite the current oil spill, 6 out of 10 people still favor offshore drilling, saying the economic benefits outweigh the environmental dangers. And the Eau Claire city council voted down the chicken ordinance, 8-3. I see a connection.

Sometimes I feel like the old Indian in the tv ad, looking at the ravaged land and cruddy water, and shedding a tear. What more can be done? Humanity will learn, eventually. When all of the breathable air, drinkable water, and fertile soil are gone, they’ll have no choice. Of course, then it will be too late.

The saddest part is, it could have been so wonderful. — Jd Belanger

Friday Evening Note: Several people have told me the picture referred to in the blog posted this morning… isn’t here! My first reaction was “How the dickens did those cagey lawyers do that?” Then son John, the computer professional, said it showed up in Safari, but not Foxfire or Internet Explorer, because those two don’t recognize TIFF images. So I converted it to jpg. It lost something in the translation, but hopefully it will at least show up!

Some people seem to be fascinated by writers and their craft. I don’t know why, and I’m not one of them. But since my latest book — my eighth and no doubt last book — has just come out, it’s National Library Week, and I’m going to be at a “book signing” at the Gilman library this afternoon, this is as close as I’ll ever get to being a big-time author. So it’s a good time to share a few behind-the-scenes stories, which I’m sure every writer has.

Some concern the fabled love-hate relationship writers have with editors and publishers. Since I’ve spent my entire professional life wearing all three hats, I’ve felt relatively immune. Yet, there are moments…

The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Raising Chickens was released last week, and I got my author’s copies the other day. (And this book was finished — met the three-alarm red-hot super-important deadline — last July.) One of the first things I noticed was the caption on the first picture, on page 2. “Chickens run wild in many places in the world, even in cities: on the streets, in grocery store parking lots, and sometimes in front of restaurants where a certain colonel is known for chicken of a different kind. Here are some feral chickens in downtown Panama City, Panama.”

Okay. A little bland, but nothing wrong with it — unless you know the whole story.

My point was that raising chickens ain’t rocket science. (Maybe I went overboard on this throughout the book, because the editors seemed to want to make everything 10 times more complicated than it has to be.) There are lots of places where chickens flourish on their own, even where some people try to discourage them, such as Key West Florida and much of Hawaii, as well as places where you’d least expect to see them, such as in front of a KFC. And I had a knock-your-socks-off photo to prove it, thanks to Staci Walker of Danville, Illinois.

The editors (there were seven of them) found the picture as hilarious and fitting as I did. But when they stopped laughing, they said the company lawyers would never go for it.

Not to be thwarted by such a minor detail, I contacted KFC. Their PR people had to run it through legal, of course. But when that all-important deadline came up and I hadn’t heard from them, I had to put some pressure on them. The lawyers tossed off a noncommittal “we will neither license nor give permission to use this photo.”

Well, to me, in lawyer-speak, that simply meant they didn’t want to get stuck okaying the picture. It certainly didn’t say we couldn’t use it. (And how could they stop anyone from showing a picture of an advertising sign, taken on a public sidewalk, anyway?) But I knew the Alpha (Idiot) lawyers would side with their KFC (chicken) colleagues, and with the deadline looming, I decided to fight it with my own (and only) weapon: words.

The cutline I wrote said chickens run wild in many places, even where a certain colonel is known for chicken of a different kind. But I added, “The prissy square-toed lawyers wouldn’t let me show you that picture, but here’s one of some feral chickens in downtown Panama City.” I thought that added a little more punch, and sort of an imaginary visual. But the prissy square-toed editors deleted it.

Here’s Staci Walker’s picture — the one the lawyers didn’t want you to see.

Staci Walker took this picture on Grand Cayman.

By the way, the Panama photo used in the book is credited to David Chase. His name really is Chase Davis. That is most likely my fault, which is another story, but it shows it ain’t easy being an editor.

There’s more — much, much more. I won’t bother mentioning the “contest” they’re running to find the “most popular” Idiot’s Guide. For one thing, I just found out about it, and it ends at midnight tonight (April 16). In addition, it involves becoming a “follower” of @IdiotsGuides on Twitter, which is all Greek to me, and sounds kind of fishy. But that’s nothing, compared to some of the other insider, behind-the-scenes stuff that goes on.

Maybe I should write a book. — Jd Belanger