Fat Geese and Chicken Feathers

10/20/2016

Fat geese and chicken feathers is a line I wrote down in one of my journals many years ago. It was an image I had from childhood when my mother fattened geese in our back yard against city ordinances. Because a few geese weren't enough to provide her with the soft down she needed to make pillows, she also plucked her own chickens for the feathers. Then she made us kids separate the soft feather from the quill until she had enough for a fluffy pillow. That was what my Polish-American childhood was like. Over the years I wrote down not just childhood images and experiences but any image that caught my attention and imagination; a quote that spoke to me; a proverb offered by my mother; an idea I didn't want to lose. I fell in love with Poland the first time I visited and there were even more journal entries. This blog is really a journal, a writers notebook exploring things a little more, a little deeper.

1 Comment

Christine Bennett

6/3/2021 11:35:51 am

I have similar memories. My mother also raised chickens in the meager area behind the barracks of our “home” in Belgium where my father worked as a coal miner. I remember pulling the soft down from the goose feathers as a teenager. We were now in the US and owned 13 acres of land on which we maintained a cow, geese, chickens and planted a vegetable garden and of course lots of flowers.

My mother made “sok” from pozeczki, blueberries and raspberries. She would add this to water to make summer drinks for us and our father.

I haven’t thought about this is quite a while.

Chris

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