Summary

The article recounts a humorous childhood anecdote where the author's younger brother, J.J., accepts a dare to eat chicken poop, cleverly using sugar to mask the taste.

Abstract

The narrative "My Little Brother Ate Chicken Poop On a Dare" details an incident where the author's brother, known for his fearlessness in accepting dares, is challenged by his older cousin, Wayne, to eat chicken poop during a family visit to their grandmother's house in Caddo, Oklahoma. The story unfolds with Wayne entering the chicken pen to collect the poop, only to be comically chased by the chickens. J.J., the little brother, outsmarts the dare by mixing the poop with sugar to make it palatable, thus fulfilling the dare without directly consuming the poop. The tale ends with J.J. proving his wit and maintaining his reputation for accepting dares, much to the chagrin of his cousin Wayne.

Opinions

The author conveys J.J.'s fearlessness and reputation for never backing down from a dare.
The story portrays Wayne as a bully who is not used to being challenged and is embarrassed by the chickens' pursuit.
The author seems to admire J.J.'s cleverness in using sugar to complete the dare without fully consuming the chicken poop.
The narrative suggests a sense of camaraderie and competition among the cousins, with the younger ones looking up to the older ones like Wayne and Danny.
The author includes a humorous tone in describing the events, emphasizing the absurdity and entertainment of the situation.
There is a subtle nod to the adults' obliviousness as they are engrossed in their own activities, allowing the children's antics to unfold unnoticed.

PURE FICTION|FICTION WRITING

My Little Brother Ate Chicken Poop On a Dare

and he’d do it again

My brother would do anything on a dare.

Don’t even suggest a ‘possible dare’ because he considers it pure cowardice to not accept your dare.

In fact, if you dared him to let an ant sting his arm, he’d let two of them sting him just so you wouldn’t say he was cheating. Not only sting him but smile grimly the entire time with that glare in his blue eyes.

One weekend my mom loaded all of us up and we headed down to visit my granny who lived in Caddo, Oklahoma.

Grandma’s house was always overflowing with aunts, uncles and cousins, and my cousins Wayne and Danny lorded it over the rest of us, being the oldest.

It was their idea to taunt my brother J.J. with a dare to eat some chicken poop out of Grandma’s chicken pen. Grandma kept some Old English Game roosters, and they were almost as mean as she was.

J.J. yelled back at his older cousin and said that he wasn’t afraid of eating the poop if Wayne thought he was big enough to get in the pen and scoop some up.

Wayne’s ears turned bright red as all of the nine younger cousins hanging around turned their eyes toward him expectantly, watching for what he’d do next. Nobody ever taunted Cousin Wayne, and like any bully he wasn’t about to show a sliver of weakness.

He marched over to the pen’s gate, unlatched it and stepped inside.

The roosters were on the far side with the hens, but their heads popped up curiously. Like any trained creatures, they knew there was only one reason why a human stepped inside the pen — and that was food. Ergo, it must be feeding time.

Cousin Wayne abruptly found himself the center of attention of 32 assorted hens and roosters all doing chicken waddles at ten miles per hour.

Each one was determined to be first in line for the chicken feed they assumed would soon be scattered all around them, a bounty to partake of. Except that Cousin Wayne was unaware of the plan.

When he found himself surrounded by a flock of beaks and chicken feet, he took off running around the pen trying to find a way to escape.

He had the presence of mind to understand that he must somehow scoop some poop before he exited or else risk making a second foray into this madhouse.

With chickens in hot pursuit of the human that was playing this unusual feeding game with them and trying to ignore the cheering and hollering of all of us outside the pen, Wayne paused for one second, stuck his hand in a pile of chicken feathers and poop and threw it over the fence.

He then made a straight bee-line for the gate and slammed it shut. He spent the next 5 minutes wiping his bare feet on the grass and trying to clean out detritus from between his toes.

In the meantime, J.J. had sneaked off to granny’s kitchen and stolen a handful of white sugar from the canister. Fortunately, Grandma and the other adults were all gathered around the dining room table drinking coffee and smoking and generally being too loud to hear sounds from a sneaky grandkid pilfering in the pantry.

J.J. was small enough to sidle into the pile of cousins as if he’d never left and when Wayne found a stick to pick up the bit of poop to take it over to him, J.J. calmly doused the pile in sugar and took a great big lick.

Leaving it in his mouth, he opened up wide so we could all see the poop in there, you know, as corroborating evidence that he’d kept up his end of the dare.

He swished it around for about 5 seconds.

I gagged just a bit at that, and so did Ruthie and Connie, Aunt Margaret’s 7-year-old twins.

J.J. then spit out the mix of sugar and poop causing Wayne to howl. “No fair!”

“You never said I had to swallow.” J.J. laughed at him, hands on his scrawny hips.

Write for Medium with this affilate link (it won’t cost you extra, but I’ll get a portion of the fee). If you’d like, you can make a small donation here. No chickens, fictional or otherwise, were harmed in the production of this story.