Actually, it's a miserable day around here today -- foggy, rainy, dark, dank, slippery oak leaves everywhere, a breeze that manages to blow every raindrop into your face. So it's not a particularly nice day for a self-respecting chicken to come visiting. But there she was this morning, shuffling around in the leaf piles next to the clubhouse, doing her own version of the two-step as she hunted for the occasional soggy bug -- our very own Rhode Island red hen.

I admit I was happy to see her. She hadn't put in an appearance since Thanksgiving, and I was beginning to worry that she had been the honored guest at a Thanksgiving dinner thrown by a little old lady who still knows how to twist a neck and pluck a feather. I sill worry about her, though. She doesn't seem to be the least bit afraid of cars, and the neighborhood has its share of big dogs on thin leashes held by 90-pound weaklings. Much as I am getting to like the neighborhood chicken, I wish she would stay safely at home!

Unless,of course, she is home, at least in her little chicken brain. Could she be bedding down in our shrubbery? Leaving her brown eggs hidden among the leaf piles? Maybe she heard about the family of eleven ducklings that became hand-fed pets of the entire condo community last summer. Is she hoping to get similar hand-outs from soft-hearted residents? Maybe! But even our own ducklings had sense enough to move on once the weather turned colder. The duck family doesn't seem to have moved far. They were possibly spotted over at the Baptist Church, which has a much bigger pond than we do -- one that is not nearly so likely to freeze over.

But our little red hen does not seem to have any such survival instinct. She just struts around, being a chicken. I  understand that there are many advantages to free-range chickens, but most of those advantages have to do with the people who eat them. What about the free-ranging chicken herself? is she happier? Better fed? Inspired to lay more eggs? Or should we be looking for someone to take in our "rescue-chicken," who definitely seems to need a new "forever home."

Dear Chicken,

I saw you for the first time a couple of weeks ago.  My husband called you a rooster, but I was pretty sure you were just a Rhode Island Red hen. You were puttering around our yard, digging the live bugs out of our fresh flowerbed mulch. I asked you where your home coop was because I knew you didn’t belong in this fenced-in condo community.  Our residents are mostly senior citizens, and they frown on any sort of animal life, except for their own leashed dogs. Cats are not allowed outside, and I know neighbors who nearly have  a heart attack if a mouse  or a water bug crawls under their garage door. I knew you would not be a popular visitor. And I can’t imagine what they would do if they found an egg in their yard.

That day, you took my suggestion and went clucking off toward the fence. I worried about you a little bit. I knew you could get past the fence. It is, after all, only a symbolic fence, with two rails. You probably walked right under it. On the other side of the fence, though, there’s a road, and I knew you were going to cross it. Oh well, I reassured myself, chickens have been crossing roads for a very long time. She’ll know what she’s doing. That was the end of our brief acquaintance. Until this morning!

What were you doing hanging around the Club House? The swimming pool is closed for the season, and even our resident wild duck family (with all their 11 ducklings) left last week for a warmer location. You were close to the road again —(See, I still worry about you!) — but you seemed quite pleased with the chance to investigate our flower beds. You were kicking dry leaves, too, and I know how much fun that can be.

But that’s not the real problem. Has no one told you that Thanksgiving will be here in three more days? It’s the most dangerous day of the year for poultry, as any turkey would tell you. And in this little community, where most houses have only one or two residents, a nice fat chicken like yourself would make an appealing substitute for one of those bigger birds. So please go home! Scurry back across the road and into the woods on your way to your home coop. I don’t want you to end up on a platter.