The bantam rooster came to live at our farm courtesy of my parents’ old friends Ollie and Rita. My parents couldn’t understand why Rita was laughing so much when my father accepted Ollie’s generous offer of a magnificent rooster of dark plumage.
It wasn’t long before all became clear as the feathered “Ollie” began to reveal his true colours and nature. Ollie was a terrifying misogynist who would shame the Taliban with his tactics. His only redeeming trait, a dubious one, was that he exercised a certain impartiality in his dislike of females. Young, old, glamorous or ourdoorsy, he made no exception and would launch an attack on any passing female without the slightest provocation. We could never figure out how he could distinguish tiny female children from male ones but he made no mistakes.
No female visitor was safe. My mother, sister and I were regularly subjected to vicious sustained attacks and could no longer frequent the farmyard adjacent to the house. Even when my mother swung the yard-brush at him almost decapitating him he was not to be deterred and she was forced to beat a hasty retreat to the safety of the house. Meanwhile my father, brother and Ollie of course were free to roam as they pleased.
Finally my mother had enough of his antics and it looked like Ollie’s days were numbered and the boiling pot beckoned. As he lingered on death row, as arrogant as ever, my mother had a light-bulb moment and a solution dawned, he would go to live with my two bachelor uncles, Jack and Joe. Once there Ollie settled in well and soon became known affectionately, at least to my uncles as “the Rottweiler”, a name he lived up to. The uncles were delighted with him, not being that pushed about female company themselves. The three of them lived very companionably for a number of years in their male enclave during which time no female could safely step over the threshold of the gate and few attempted it.
When Ollie finally departed for that great chicken coop in the sky, my uncles were truly sad to see him go. No tears were ever shed in our house though when news of his demise filtered through.
