{"id":10117,"date":"2026-09-09T07:19:55","date_gmt":"2026-09-09T14:19:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/?p=10117"},"modified":"2026-09-09T07:19:55","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T14:19:55","slug":"fried-chicken-at-dawn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/meditations\/fried-chicken-at-dawn\/","title":{"rendered":"Fried Chicken at Dawn"},"content":{"rendered":"<!-- wp:themify-builder\/canvas \/-->\n\n\n<p>A homeless man eats convenience store fried chicken at dawn from a bench overlooking Coos Bay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A homeless man discovers a container of convenience store fried chicken at dawn on a sidewalk,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>examines it,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>sits down on a curb, eats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A homeless woman carries a drumstick of convenience store fried chicken at dawn in her right hand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Another drumstick protrudes from a back pocket like a colored comb from the 70s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Remember when men and women wore them in the back pockets of their flared jeans and never used them?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I count three discarded but not completely empty containers of convenience store fried chicken at dawn during a walk with Elmer to the mudflats. One rests atop a mailbox.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Leftovers for smart crows and meandering humans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We know where the sustenance will take the crows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What about the humans?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What&#8217;s going on with all this ubiquitous convenience store fried chicken at dawn in my neighborhood?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Marvin Gaye asked something similarin an era<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>when the red and white bucket of KFC, (original recipe)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>with all the fixins,&#8217;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Colonel looking on,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>served us Friday night dinner during the school year,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>when my single mother treated us,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>too exhausted after teaching second grade to cook.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The beagle instantly recognized that bucket when she brought it inside<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>and waited patiently in the basement for skin and gravy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The recent juxtaposition of fried chickens past and present<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>deep fry something very portentous inside me,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>and elsewhere.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A homeless man eats convenience store fried chicken at dawn from a bench overlooking Coos Bay. A homeless man discovers a container of convenience store fried chicken at dawn on a sidewalk, examines it, sits down on a curb, eats. A homeless woman carries a drumstick of convenience store fried chicken at dawn in her [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10118,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1264,5,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-coos-bay","category-meditations","category-poetry","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10117"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10117\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10120,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10117\/revisions\/10120"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10118"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}