It was Good Friday, the day my little, biddy, buddy bought it! A child of nature in the shape of a red squirrel. I called him “ Red ”, which I know shows a startling lack of imagination, but I didn’t feel I had the right to be creative, not having his ownership papers. I once had a cat I named “Cat” only because he came with the apartment I rented while attending the University of Manitoba, and I was certain he already had a name. But that’s another story. Anyway, Red was the source of many smiles and laughs during a long and lonely winter of self imposed isolation.
In December I had hung a swinging bird feeder from a beam under the front porch veranda to attract the Chickadees, Kinglets or any other birds that felt like a winter snack. I didn’t realize at the time the great amount of angst and frustration it would cause Red. He tried every trick he knew and invented a few more in his quest to conquer the feeder. While I sat working at my computer, I could watch him from the picture window as he schemed and analyzed. He would run along the railing and try to scale the corner post only to slide back down .He would climb to the window sill and try to scamper up the window to a lamp that would put him a mere three feet from his target. Didn’t work! I could see his little brain working as he tried to solve his dilemma. “If I climb to the railing, jump to the window frame, then shinny up the wall to the lamp I could then leap the remaining three feet to dinner!” His head would move from side to side and up and down as he worked out all the possibilities. I don’t suppose he ever thought about how he could cling to a plastic, swinging bird feeder or in the unlikely event that he successfully completed his mission how to return safely to the deck. I think he suffered from a severe case of tunnel vision.
Although he feasted daily on the grain and nuts the birds kicked off or rejected, he continued his obsession all through the winter. One day after sweeping the snow off the deck, I leaned the push broom up against the window close to the lamp. This proved to be an accidental instrument of torture for Red as he tried time after time to scale the slippery broom handle only to land in a heap on the deck.
I believe his most frustrating and infuriating moments came as he approached the object of his torment from above. I could hear his tiny footfalls on the roof, scampering back and forth, and see his tiny face peeking upside down from the overhang only two feet away from his tempting target. He managed the main beam and for a few promising seconds found a four-pawed grip on the corner post, a mere six inches from the feeder. It was only when he reached out a paw to swipe at or try to grip his swaying dinner that he lost his paw hold and crashed to the deck. I swear the air turned blue with rodent curses. Although I could see he was clearly losing his battle, as well as his mind, he never gave up in his attempt to solve the mystery that was the bird feeder.
Red was also obsessed with me. He would sit on the woodpile just outside my window not three feet away and watch as I plunked away on my keyboard. We would stare at each other in a contest of nerves to see who would blink first. I never won! I would occasionally stare at him cross eyed and I swear after a time he would do the same, proved I thought, when he took an uncharacteristic tumble after taking a wrong turn on the top log.
On the occasion that my wife Linda and our equally crazy standard poodle Taja would visit from the city, (I meant crazy in reference to the squirrel and not to Linda.) Red would lose all interest in me in an attempt to bend Taja’s brain a little further. He would tease her mercilessly. At one point even running through her legs.
Needless to say, Red and myself became friends over the winter and early spring. It was in the early afternoon of Good Friday as I went to fill my cleaning bucket from the rain barrel that I discovered Red face down and lifeless in the water. I felt terrible and sad as I lifted him out by the tail. I felt responsible for not having the foresight to cover the barrel against such a happening. Shortly afterwards I left for a visit in the city knowing that when I returned on Easter Sunday I would not be greeted by my furry, little, winter jester.
People deal with loss in different ways. I chose to deal with Red’s departure as he would have wanted... with a sense of humor, although dark. When I relayed my story to my sons in Alberta, my youngest, Ashley, asked “What was he doing in the rain barrel?” I replied “Laps...I think!” I do believe Reds’ demise was a tragic accident, although suicide has not been ruled out.
I don’t believe Red had any family in the area, but if he did, and if you are reading this, rest assured, he had a proper send off. Any neighbor close enough to hear, must have been curious on Easter Sunday why the strains of Amazing Grace and Taps, played with appropriate reverence on my beat up harmonica, could be heard rising above the white pines of Loon Lake.
Given the significance of the day of Red’s departure and as one of God’s creatures, I somewhat expect a visit to my wood pile, by an albino squirrel with large crossed eyes, buck teeth and a Halo who just may, finally, have a solution to the bird feeder puzzle .
Dan Blix
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