Watch Out Below!
September 5, 2022 by terrypetersen
"Rarely does one see a squirrel tremble."
Zadie Smith.
The air in Canada carries peace—until a black
squirrel attack begins.
“Watch out!” a fellow traveler calls as an
acorn whizzes past me from the roof
of the motel.
Squashed acorns appear all over
the parking lot.
The squirrel appears and searches through
the pieces. Humans aren’t a target now.
It’s buffet time.
All I know for certain is that I am not
invited. The woman who saw the critter's
prank,smiles.
She and I talk. We feast on the moment,
the serendipity of meeting others.
illustration made from cut paper and colored pencil
terrypetersen 
Lovely incident, seemingly trivial, but could change the world.
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An enormous oak tree next door drops many tiny pinging acorns. Decades ago, one such acorn found its way to our perennial garden. It cracked open and developed a tiny fragile shoot. Now, many decades later, I can barely wrap my arms around the oak that it became. Tree-hugging is still my favorite contact sport. 🙂
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The crunching continues as the wind quakes more crackle-ready ‘corns onto the driveway that we share with the young family who moved next door decades ago. Now the toddlers are fully grown adults who are now in their early 20s.
Their massive oak will soon be cleared of deadwood in this ominously warm winter. Our massive water maple received a much-needed dead wooding last year and is happy that it now thrives past the century mark. I proclaim that she fancies herself a flapper of the Betty Boop tradition. She dreams of a second childhood. We think she is up to the task.
Our latest rescued friend is a Mancun, His tail is always upright. Mr. Fozzy Dingo wants to fly a Ukrainian flag in honor of Joe Biden’s brilliant and daring address in Kiev. Putin fancied himself Putin the Terrible. He got his wish. He envies his friend Don and dreams of Mr. T. His only option now is to stand near an open window, just to see if he might fall out the window…somehow.
Ironically, his dreams of success had him drawing the Uncle Joe Stalin card — the one with the death card. Suddenly, the death cards fly into the air to confront him with the faces of the 10,000 soldiers he dispatched to death so far. The old fool fodderizes them to the God of Hubris.
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