The Sixth Chick

On an otherwise unremarkable afternoon, I watched what appeared to be a lone quail pick its way down a hillside, turning first this way, then that, gradually charting a zig-zag course west to east, north to south across the field.

As I was wattching, five chicks came into view following their mother. They too turned from west to east, north to south, replicating her course almost perfectly.

I’m sure there were slight deviations in their paths but I didn’t notice anything dramatic. They were a team — one big one leading the way, five little ones following and learning in the process.

As they gradually snaked their way out of view, something else caught my eye. It was a sixth chick, far behind, lurching wildly from further up the hill. This one didn’t replicate the path of its mother and siblings.

Instead it forged its own route as it raced to catch up with the clutch.

That sixth chick, always somehow out of step. We’ve probably all known one.

HEADLINES:

• Deep cuts erode the foundations of US public health system, end progress, threaten worse to come (AP)

• An astonishing raid deep inside Russia rewrites the rules of war (Economist)

• Rival Victory Claims as Poland’s Presidential Election Goes Down to Wire (NYT)

• Homeland Security Cops Invade NY Congressman’s Office, Handcuff Aide (Mother Jones)

• Can Trump fix the national debt? Republican senators, many investors and even Elon Musk have doubts (AP)

• How a small wine company complicated Trump’s sweeping tariff plans (WP)

• Saudi Arabia says Israel shows 'extremism' by blocking West Bank visit (Reuters)

• Discrimination cases unravel as Trump scraps core civil rights tenet (WP)

• Jamie Dimon says China isn’t America’s biggest threat. It’s ‘the enemy within’ (CNN))

• Trump’s Playbook to Cripple “60 Minutes” and the Press (New Yorker)

• Boulder attack updates: 6 injured in 'act of terror' with 'makeshift flamethrower' (ABC)

• Gay history was made in D.C. At times, it was dispiriting — but also uplifting. (WP)

• ‘Copy’ Of Magna Carta Bought By Harvard For $27 Found To Be Real (The Onion