Tolerance in we humans is often a tough call. We could take an invaluable lesson from the story of the abandoned monkey in China who found security and caring under the wing of a white pigeon... or could we?

It reminded me of our own personal lesson in tolerance from a black chicken and a black and white mixed dog named Barley.

The chicken was raised from a chick along with about twenty other chicks by our sons. They .. the chicks ...were finally at the hen stage ... old enough to be put free in the chicken coop ... taken out of the confines of the insulated pen used for growing purposes .. and they were finally producing eggs ... great green and brown and white fresh eggs ... when one night the coop door was left ajar or the latch wasn't latched properly... and ... in went the fox.

The result was a wholesale massacre of the chickens ... rooster included.

There was only one survival.... a black chicken who managed somehow to escape the hunger of the fox and flutter madly to the garage... to join the dog Barley.. a wonderful old pal of ours around the age of ten years.

The dog welcomed the most likely scarred-for-life chicken ... who surely would never again trust that chicken coop .. and took the chicken under its paws. The chicken stood on one side of the water dish with the dog drinking out of the other side. They shared dog food .. one from one side of the food dish .. the other directly across.

The chicken followed the dog around like a shadow .. sleeping with Barley... laying in the shade with him.

The irony is that under normal conditions.. Barley would've gladly followed the route of the fox and enjoyed the chicken chase.

This tolerance for something so different .. something which would normally have been enjoyed for dinner ... seemed to be an eye opener to us as humans. However.. we knew at the same time that we could not ever compare ourselves to that level of tolerance ... after all we are humans.. not animals.

Oh.. we can sit across the table from someone different from us... we can open our homes to strangers in need.... we are capable of tolerance.

We also have emotions of every nature to deal with .. .along with opinions and feelings that have been building in us from a very young age that are very hard to change ... along with personalities comprised of uncountable traits that we must live with... things that make it so hard to do those things that require tolerance.

Education is a very powerful tool .. but often even that.. even if we know something to be true or not true ... our self will not give us permission to fully acknowledge that and the negative attitude is allowed to fester and grow instead of change.

We do learn we cannot be all best of friends .. and do quite well at tolerating from a distance... most likely with sharp pains of conscience in many instances... or at least a knowledge of the differences that keep distances between people ... differences no one can change or is at fault for. It is after all ..life.. We learn to tolerate enough to keep peace in our immediate surroundings.

An animal is just that .. an animal .. and somehow must just survive by animal iinstinct.

The black chicken and the dog got along wonderfully... for 8 or ten weeks.

Reality of what he really had there must have hit the dog one day.... or just plain animal instinct.

We found the black chicken dead ... Barley quietly and nonchalantly sitting next to it.

A lesson in tolerance?

A lesson in the differences between human and animal.

Barley suffered no pains of conscience for his deed. He was perfectly satisfied.

Without so much as a glance at the chicken.. he ran off to chase a bird.