Hubby built me a bird pen six years ago, flinging tools and swearing and declaring that he’d never build me anything again. The enclosure was home to two Bantam hens, Arnborg and Circe, which were rescued from behind a local farm store several years ago. The Easter Bunny forgot to pick them up, and the store owner got tired of feeding them, so he turned them loose in the woods out back.

The pen was great, escape and cat-proof, but it was mere wood, and over the years it got more and more rickety. One morning a couple of weeks ago, I walked outside with a bowl of food for the girls, and found the pen collapsed onto itself. The hens were fine. I don’t think they even knew what had happened, but even Hubby had to admit it was time for a new chicken pen.

I got a book of chicken coop plans and picked out the one that I wanted. It was lovely, with Shaker shingles and flower boxes. I showed it to Hubby. He rolled his eyes and let me know in no uncertain terms just how likely I was to get anything other than the basic model.

He came up with a plan and started making trips to Home Depot. I stood by, waiting to tote tools and bottles of water. I got ready to lecture him on the usage of bad language in a neighborhood full of kids.

But he didn’t cuss. He seemed to…like it. Everything went smoothly; he sailed through the project without incident. He even humored my longing for a cute cottage hen house by making a genuine stained glass transom for above the pen door.

When it was time for the big unveiling, Chris asked me to retrieve the girls from their old pen, and deposit them in the new one. Have I mentioned that these chickens are wild? They were grown when someone captured them out behind the feed and seed. I chased and cajoled, I told the entire north side of town exactly what I thought about chickens in general. I threatened a bar-b-que.

Then, I stepped on a nail. Barefoot. In the chicken pen.

When I stopped hopping and cussing at the top of my lungs and lifted my foot to assess the damage, I saw that the nail was attached to a small block of wood. To remove it, I had to grab the wood and pull. It didn’t want to come out. I pulled harder, expecting to hear a sucking noise as the nail came free. It was silent, but I was not, and when I looked at the nasty thing, it was wet for the first quarter of an inch, and covered in dried chicken poop for the rest of the inch or so that was jutting from the chunk of wood.

I hadn’t had a tetanus shot for 25 years. And I’d jabbed a quarter of an inch of doo-doo into my foot!

Honestly, lockjaw couldn’t have been that much worse than the tetanus shot ordeal. The personnel were nice enough, but the place was chock full of young lackadaisical mothers and their runny-nosed children.

I signed in and sat among the throng of wormy toddlers. They milled, diapers drooping, fingers spelunking in various orifices, around the room…touching things… and watching “Jerry Springer”. I and about 20 three-year-olds can now tell the difference between a woman and a drag queen 90 percent of the time.

I’d been there a while when the receptionist called for me in a panic. It seemed that I’d lived 45 years without getting any shots, except for a smallpox vaccination and an injection for Typhus when I was an infant. I think she was expecting me to start hacking and coughing right there. I pointed out that I’d been trundled back and forth from Europe regularly when I was a baby, so that explained the shot to prevent Typhus, not treat it, and that I’d matriculated through twelve years of public school and gone on to college, so obviously I’d had my shots. I don’t know if they believed me, but they gave me my tetanus shot anyway.

I managed not to get infected by either the chicken poop or the rheumy-eyed kids, and my hens have a wonderful new house. I still have to paint it, but the sun’s shining through the stained glass, and the screened door makes a pleasing “thwack!” when it closes. I’ve stopped limping, and I’m glad Hubby’s getting over his aversion to building things, because I’m thinking a gazebo would be just the thing.