Years ago, we lived in town with a small lot that we transformed into a very large garden. Once a month, we parked the car on the street so that a friend could dump a pick-up load of horse manure in our driveway; one wheelbarrow load at a time we moved this gold sludge from the front yard to the back. Our neighbors were patient and forebearing.

In addition to the horse manure, we received loads of straw, sand, gravel, lime, bark -- the wheelbarrow was in constant use, and the car pretty much lived in the street. Our neighbors continued to be patient and forebearing.

But the garden was incredible. It was small but luxuriant, our Eden and escape from urban life (as this was in a town of 6,000, one can get an idea of our tolerance level of urban life).

We dreamed of having a place in the country where, not limited by space, we could grow the garden that we were trying to cram into our city lot. And move to the country we did -- 7 acres -- plenty of space for a compost pile, a proper location for horse gold, and, of course, the garden itself.

The irony of life is such that, in our efforts to build a house ourselves, raise and homeschool four children, figure out the logistics of raising goats and chickens, and run a fine art painting business, we have had very little time to devote to the garden that we envisioned in our small lot days.

I plow up a few raised beds, pile our trusty wheel barrow with goat gold, lay down the weed barrier, and in an afternoon or two we toss in seeds. Through the season, we make sure that the garden plants are bigger than the weeds, but that's about it. Our friends in town, who plot out their garden space with a care that would make a civil engineer proud, look at us askance, in shock and irritation that we would make so little use of the resources available -- much as we looked at country dwellers when we squeezed every cubic inch of dirt out of our little city lot.

The garden, however, serves its purpose -- it produces food, which we eat. It's not the beautifully laid out estate that we envisioned when two shovels were enough to double dig our little raised beds, but it takes up the amount of time that we can give it and gives us back what we need.

My grandfather was right -- there's only so much time in a day, and some of it has to be spent sleeping. When we lived in town, the garden was our main connection to the outside world, and we treasured our time in it. Now, surrounded by tall grass, trees, the pond, and just space, it is enough to sit on the porch after a long day of working, painting, fixing things that break, chopping wood, or digging in the garden, and sip a glass a wine, secure in the knowledge that a good day's work has been put in, and it is acceptable to admit that I'm tired and I just want to sit awhile.

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Peruvian Fishermen -- Oil on Canvas: 9x12

Even in a nation obsessed by sports, we talk far too much about teamwork, generally doing so in a manner meant to bring us all into the fold.

The message is proclaimed in our schools, from the pulpit, at seminars -- "We need to work as a team!" we are admonished, images of happy, smiling people, hands and voices raised to the skies as they sing, "When we all pull together . . . how happy we'll be!"

But as any brave soul who has volunteered to coach Little League will attest, real sports teams that are out to win don't always work together smoothly for the good of all the team members. To paraphrase George Orwell, "Some people are more important team members than others," and the purpose of the Others is to make sure that the Some People have their chance to shine -- and woe to the lesser team member who fumbles the ball or tries something new that doesn't succeed as well as it should have.

We forget, when we drone on about teamwork, that the ultimate purpose of the team is to win, and sometimes the process of winning is a messy one -- for the other team, certainly, but also for the winners as well.

But a couple of years ago, a women's softball game between Western Washington University and Central Washington University resulted in teamwork as we theoretically propound it but rarely actually do it. A short movie was made of this game, the link to which can be found in my Links section under The Home Run That Almost Wasn't. Even if you, like me, are a decidedly non-team-sports fan, this seven-minute feature is well worth watching, and the surprise but true ending is a real day maker.

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Where the River Bends -- Oil on Canvas: 30x24

When it comes to animal intelligence, admittedly, the chicken is not the first one that comes to mind. An excellent horror movie could be wrapped around a giant form of one of these primeval fowls, pecking its way through Tokyo or New York, perhaps landing at the top of the Empire State Building and flapping its wings in victorious crow.

But I digress. We were discussing the wisdom of chickens.

Perhaps it is not so much that the chickens are wise themselves, but that we, watching them, can gain some wisdom of our own.

Consider the pecking order: yes, chickens have this, and yes, it is so named because they literally do peck those birds that are under them, sometimes to death.

Do we do this to each other?

Anyone who remembers junior high or middle school can most certainly remember a pecking order; as we get older, we refine our methods, but anytime we find ourselves in a group, we also find the tendency to classify ourselves and others within that group, and many times, those classifications are not very kind.

Our daughter once attended a group that sectioned the participants into one of four major animal types, based upon their perceived personality traits. I don't remember all four, but I do remember that one was a lion -- and the leader, naturally, told everyone that he was a lion with all the attendant leadership qualities -- and that another animal trait was a labrador retriever, so named because it was compliant and obedient and subservient to others. Our daughter, according to the leader, was a labrador retriever (interestingly enough, so was the leader's wife; I cannot imagine my wife's reaction were I to describe her as a labrador retriever).

This exercise was apparently somehow supposed to bond the group together and increase their understanding of themselves and one another, but from our daughter's perspective, the only lesson that she took out of this foray into futility was that she was . . . a dog.

Not only do we classify others around us and allow others around us to classify us, but we willingly slap broadreaching, self-fulfilling labels upon ourselves.

"Oh, I'm a Melancholy," we may announce, or, "I'm a Type A Obsessive Compulsive," or "I'm a repressive depressive analytical nerd with a broad-ranged sense of humor." It is easy to fool ourselves into thinking that we are giving detailed, accurate descriptions of who we are -- understanding who we are is one thing; boxing ourselves up is another.

My wife says that one of her favorite aspects of artist receptions is that she knows nothing about any of the people she will be meeting and talking with through the evening: "I don't know their political views, their religious leanings, their educational backgrounds, their family dynamics -- anything," she explains to me. "I approach them with nothing more in common than that we are both human, and it is refreshing to converse with someone and have absolutely no pre-conceived idea of who they are, or who I think they are."

I find this point of view liberating, and perhaps it explains why I, too, enjoy interacting with people at these receptions. In a short space of time, we find the elements on which we connect, and if the connection is strong enough, then we continue it through the future.

If this works at a reception, my wife and I tell each other, then perhaps this principle is one that we can apply more broadly, say, in our day to day life. Perhaps instead of classifying people within our minds and assigning them a loose number in an abstract pecking order, we can approach even old relationships as if they were new, and interact with friends, family, and acquaintances as if we know nothing more about each other than that we are both human, and maintain an open mind in the continued growth of the relationship.

Perhaps we can transcend the Wisdom of Chickens and tap into our humanity.

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