Reincarnation Gone South
Everything I learned about life after death turned out to be wrong
For the life of me, I can’t figure out how I got here. A month ago, I was adjusting to my short stay in purgatory, when poof! The next thing I know, I’m a free-range roaster standing in the middle of Mandelbaum’s Poultry Farm.
My life came to an abrupt end several weeks ago during a fatal accident while rock climbing in Yosemite National Park. Given the vile and contemptible life I’ve led on earth, it came as no surprise that I’d be sent to purgatory before I made it through the heavenly gates. But, nobody told me about reincarnation. That caught me completely off guard.
Just a capon at Mandelbaum’s Farm
Granted, my pastor at Saint Filberto Bakalars Parish used to tell us that if we weren’t good little boys and girls, there was an outside chance we’d be forced to spend time in “another form,” before rising to the great beyond. But a capon at Mandelbaum’s Poultry Farm? C’mon. Give me a break. Even Bernie Madoff got to enjoy a week as a three-pound Maine Lobster (along with drawn butter, a baked potato, and dessert) before they shipped him off to hell.
I was dropped into the middle of a chicken coop on a busy Friday afternoon in the form of a mature Rhode Island Red — eight and a half pounds of pure Chicken McNuggets. The first one to approach me was a Swedish Flower Hen with a sexy, bright red wattle.
“Allen? Is that you? It’s me. Hannah Rifkin. From high school!”
Although it was nearly impossible to distinguish her features underneath the layers of feathers, I recognized that whiny voice from the five hours we spent together during our senior prom.
“Hannah, how are you? You look wonderful. Life has been good to you.”
“Aw, you’re just being nice, Allen. Ever since laying those 400 eggs, I just can’t seem to keep this extra weight off.”
“I’ve got to get out of here,” I complained to Hannah. “This has all been a terrible mistake. I didn’t even finish my deep cleaning sessions in purgatory. What happens if they ship me off to some mid-west KFC? My life will be over!”
“Well, Allen,” said Hannah. “I hate to be the one to tell you this, but your life as you knew it is already over. The best thing you can do is relax, have some more chicken feed and I’ll introduce you to a few of the Barnevelders around the yard.”
My new life without fingers
I was absolutely beside myself. I was miles away from home. I’d lost my wallet, iPhone, Kindle, and was badly in need of a Xanax. I hadn’t spoken to either my publisher or my therapist in over ten days and was three weeks behind in my memoir. I had no way of sending anyone an email to let them know what was going on. And even if I did, without fingers, it was impossible to send any of my friends text messages.
“So, you don’t think you belong at Mandelbaum Farms, don’t you?” Feibush Gavel was the General Manager at Mandelbaum Farms.
“No, there’s been a terrible mistake,” I said. “I’m supposed to be on my way to heaven — or, at the very least, the Iowa Writer’s Workshop.”
“Well, I’ve heard that before,” said Feibush. “You know, you could do a lot worse. Some of the poor souls that have dropped down from purgatory as poulards never even got a chance to be Applebees Chicken Fingers. They were sold for cockfights or, even worse, Hindu cremation ceremonies. Some of them ended up being sacrificed during Santerian rituals or slaughtered for kapparots.” I gasped.
“But I have a master’s degree in Aramaic Cultures. I haven’t even started paying back my student loans yet. There must be something you can do for me.”
Feibush thought about my predicament. He hated sending a college-educated cockerel out into the world to become an order of hot wings. Instead, he made me Manager in Charge of the free-range herd.
It was my job to interview, perform background checks and pre-employment drug screenings on the new incoming chicks to determine if they were qualified to roam freely on the ranch. The hardest part was getting a twelve-week-old chick to pee in a cup.
There’s life after Mandelbaum Farms
After seven years, my sight began to go, so Feibush shipped me off to the Mandelbaum Farms Retirement Home for Aging Poultry, where I lived out the rest of my earth-based life with a group of old Crevecoeurs, Orpingtons, and Cuckoo Marans. Eventually, I was invited up to heaven, where I now while away the day, swapping stories with other clucks who didn’t fare as well as I did. I love hearing their stories of narrowly escaping deep fryers filled with boiling peanut oil, or even worse, being trained as service cocks.
After all the things that have happened, I consider myself fortunate to be a college-educated pecker in heaven. Things could have been a lot worse. A lot worse.
