PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Portland, Oregon, police were told there was a chicken — and it was attempting to cross the road. In fact, the citizen who called the police non-emergency line on Monday evening reported that the chicken's efforts to cross a road in a north Portland neighborhood were bringing traffic nearly to a standstill.
I was called in on the Chicken-Crossing-the-Road Case in Portland. The suspect is still at large, and they needed my unique services. I'm an animal profiler.
It's sort of like one of those guys who profiles serial killers, you know, looks at their modus operandi and discovers they had mommy issues or whatever. I really want to be a serial-killer profiler, but those jobs are way harder to get than they led me to believe back at Yale. Yes, I have an associate degree in profiling from Bernie Yale's College of Criminal Justice 'n' Stuff. Anyway, I'm filling in with part-time work profiling animal crimes until I make it to the big leagues.
So what have I learned about Chicken X? (Chicken X is the name I've assigned her until I've discovered her real name.) Well, to start with, we have to firmly establish she really is a chicken. The person who called 912 (The non-emergency police number. If you just want to chat, you can call 913) said it was a chicken, but eyewitnesses are notoriously unreliable. In Newark, just last year, there was some vandalism allegedly perpetrated by a "monkey." Turned out to be a chimpanzee. So you never know. Could be a chicken, could be a rooster. Could be a hen. Could even be a pullet, you never know.
Nevertheless, I'll stake my reputation on it, that this really is a chicken. Roosters are aggressive and - if you'll pardon the expression - cocky, but they aren't road-crossers. Roosters prefer to stay put. Chickens on the other hand often have deep-seated insecurities about themselves. All their lives they've been called "chicken," and this gives them a subconscious desire to prove themselves. They begin to wonder about their identity - "Did the egg come before me?" they ask themselves, "Or is the egg something that comes after me?" They can drive themselves crazy with this sort of circular thinking.
Once a chicken begins this downward spiral, she just can't help herself. Show her a road, and she just has to cross it. Ask a chicken why and she'll say, "To get to the other side." But that's just a rationalization. The deeper question is why does she want to get to the other side. Does she believe on the other side, she'll be different in some way? That she will find the answers to life's dilemmas that have eluded her? Or is this a subconscious desire for death - that she wishes to cross over? Does she secretly want to be a rooster?
The truth is, in a case like this, there are many answers and no answer.
I only hope we can find her before she crosses again.
