squirrels raze they eat your brains in kentucky. other places, they eat the meat of you. those of you who live in trees are acrobatic spies with teeth that go on growing as long as you draw breath. here you form gangs, give yourselves names like "the diablos" and "the bushy-tailed bad boys", and when one of your brethren is perched on our fence peering in through a kitchen window, i know it's because he's been sent by one of the higher-ups to case the house. it's the eyes that give it away. 140502 ... raze this one guy, i named him jimmy. i can't remember why. maybe he just looked like a jimmy to me. he's fearless. he'll walk right up to you and with his little brown eyes he'll ask, "carrying anything edible today?" i once saw him contrive a way to fit three whole peanuts into his mouth, shells and all. he would have tried for four, i'm sure, but the other squirrels were watching, and he has a reputation to uphold. 201026 ... raze jimmy jumped up on my leg. i don't think i ever thought i'd see the day a squirrel would just casually do a thing like that. not sure if he thought i was a tree or he was just being friendly and saying, "thanks for the food." 201109 ... raze he's perfected the two-nut shuffle now. doesn't even need to used his hands anymore. he just moves the first peanut over a bit and slides the second one into his mouth, face to the ground, and then off he goes to bury them both somewhere. 210509 ... raze get outta here, superfluous d, messing with my tenses and shit. 210509 ... raze i hadn't seen jimmy in a while. i was starting to think he moved on to a different park. but then there he was. he came running toward me with something in his mouth. it was one of those little breadsticks you get in a bag of chex mix. he was holding it like a sword between his teeth. like he wanted to show me the treasure he found. i tossed him a peanut and he slid it into his mouth without dropping the breadstick. without even moving it. tucked it right in front. then he looked up at me with that proud face of his and ran the other way, carrying the old treasure and the new. 210710 ... raze his autumn coat is starting to come in. there's a patch of red on his back i've never seen before. he's as fearless as ever. such beautiful swagger in that bounce of his. 210916 ... tender square i'll just leave this here. enjoy! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFZFjoX2cGg 210917 ... raze i'd say, "that's brilliant," but i don't know if "brilliant" is a good enough for for what that is. (also, phantastic gus is officially my hero now.) 210917 ... raze that's right. for for. FOR FOR! NO WORD CAN SURVIVE THE POWER OF FOR FOR. 210917 ... raze they were out in full force today. i saw: the newsom twosome jimmy skeeter (the skittish one) sniper (the stealthy one) bouncer and all the stragglers who don't like to get too close. at the base of a tree was a grey squirrel who wasn't quite a baby but was younger than any squirrel i've ever seen away from the nest. he moved very slowly and stopped to inspect everything he saw on the ground around him. an adult black squirrel ran over to steal a peanut. he braced himself for a fight, thinking he was encroaching on someone else's territory. the little grey one didn't pay any attention to him. the black one hung back a bit with a peanut poking out of his mouth. he stared at the grey child and then at me with what looked like bafflement, while the child looked at the peanuts the same way he looked at everything else. he didn't know what was food and what wasn't. he didn't even know what he was supposed to be afraid of. everything was new to him, and all that innocence and curiosity was etched into his little face. 210918 ... unhinged i can tell fall is coming when the squirrels are busy and bustling 210918 ... tender square walking through the arb today, i stopped to snap a pic of my favorite tree. suddenly, a bunch of debris fell from the branches, startling us, then stopped. roxette’s “must’ve been love” came into my head, but i changed the lyrics: “it must’ve been squirrels but it’s over now; they must’ve found food but they lost it somehow.” 210919 ... raze one of them left a walnut in the corner of the mailbox, still in its green shell. i thought it was an old tennis ball at first. as unlikely as it is, i'm telling myself this is a gift from one of our friends in the park. i mean, what are the chances of a squirrel climbing into your mailbox to stash something that's almost too big to fit inside? 210925 ... tender square on today's arb walk, three black squirrels. i've never seen black squirrels in ann arbor the entire eleven years i've lived here—i only ever notice them in windsor. we saw two 10 feet from one another on the way into the park and i said aloud, "we're going to see a third." on the way through the basin to leave the park, i spotted the last one. 210926 ... tender square on today’s arb walk, i spotted more elusive black squirrels; i watched one chase after another as they parkoured off a network of branches. 211001 ... unhinged i was in the park searching for mushrooms. they are everywhere now much like the squirrels (who like to collect mushrooms too and hang them in trees to dry which actually exponentially increases their vitamin d content, is one of the only sources of vitamin d in the squirrel diet). many squirrels were rushing around the park, busy collecting and occasionally stopping to eat. i could see a pair in the same little copse of conifers, big bushy tails flicking. next thing i know one is rushing towards me, only stops a couple feet away, tail flicking. i backed up a couple steps as the squirrel stopped. we danced together like this for a few seconds before i realized the squirrel was trying to chase me away from where the other squirrel was foraging, probably a male protecting a female. so i decided to keep it moving and do my own foraging somewhere else. i turned back to look and mr squirrel was still sitting in the same place watching closely to make sure i was actually leaving. 211009 ... nr i like the gutsy ones. my brother was sitting at his desk in his bedroom in vancouver with the window open. there was a squirrel on the tree right out the window who was eyeing him. he left for a few minutes and came back, and the chocolate bar that had been on his desk had disappeared. i had bought sushi takeout in toronto and put it on a bench at a park. a squirrel hopped right up and started nudging the back with its nose. i was like "ummm no, this is not for you" and it looked at me and hopped down. 211012 ... raze there's more red in the black of jimmy's back every time i see him now. i tell him it's his irish colour showing through. we both know azure blue is the true colour of ireland, but we aren't about to let a thing like that interfere with our plans. not that we have any concrete plans. yet. here's what happens when you drop a dozen unshelled peanuts on the path for jimmy to have: he picks one up and eats it while he looks at you, thanking you with his eyes. then he does it again, and again, until all the nuts are gone. and here's what happens when you crouch down to his level and hold out a shelled peanut: he hesitates for a second. his face seems to say, "are you sure you're okay with this?" then he opens his mouth and takes the peanut, using his hands to steady it, and you're surprised by how much power he has in his tiny body, how strong his grip is. at the same time, you're struck by the respect he shows you. you can feel him holding back, making sure what you experience is a true exchange instead of the sensation of something being torn from a human hand by twenty teeth that never stop growing. you do this three times. he buries one of the peanuts and digs up a walnut he's hidden in the dirt. he holds it up to show you, saying, "look. look at this treasure. it's all around us." you don't say it, but you're thinking, "i hope you know you're one of those precious things, you beautiful wild irishman." 211015 ... raze sniper got stuck behind a grey squirrel i haven't seen before, who was bolder than anticipated. the grey one got a peanut. sniper didn't. he considered starting a fight. then he thought better of it. he got a bit of a running start and leapt, treating the squirrel in front of him as a hurdle, sailing over the clueless interloper with such grace i could only laugh. 211031 ... raze haven't seen the more skittish half of the newsom twosome lately, but the bolder one abandoned her post to follow us halfway around the park. four times. she'll come right up to our feet now and just sit there and wait for food, and then she'll eat it in front of us. she's the cutest. 211113 ... raze today i was asking them if they saw the red_tailed_hawk on thursday. wasn't that some crazy shit? did they know the squirrel that didn't make it? newsom was a little solemn, but she was philosophical about it. sniper was his usual taciturn self. then there was this shiny black squirrel i'd never seen before. he didn't try to run when i got close. i waved to him. he waved back. 211120 ... unhinged are slower and fatter these days 211121 ... raze newsom buries her food on both sides of the path, taking great care to conceal each bit of work with orange leaves. then she turns to me as if to say, "that's how it's done." springer's coat is getting so thick he looks like a tiny grizzly bear. butterscotch is up in her tree with a mouthful of leaves, ready to insulate her drey for the winter, when she sees us coming and spits them all out so she can come down and say hello. it looks like she's belching red smoke. the magnificent six are seven now, after the addition of a little grey squirrel with a bit of brown in her coat. four of the seven are grey. three are black. they all munch on peanuts inches away from one another, and little guy, with his great caramel swirl of a tail, hangs to the right, his cone-dominated retinas taking in all the light that's given, making some good pictures for his mind to dream on later. 211204 ... raze sometimes they show up in my dreams. newsom introduces me to her babies and gives me a look that seems to say, "this job isn't all it's cracked up to be." little guy lets me pet him and his fur is so soft it surprises me a little. jimmy runs in circles along the walls of a darkened theater in a universe where craig ferguson is still hosting a late night show. in my waking_life, they show up even when it's a wet, miserable day. they're more reliable and appreciative than a lot of the people i've known. they don't ask for much in exchange for their friendship. just some peanuts and good conversation. 211219 ... tender_square megan cornered me at the party as i left the bathroom. "so, i heard you like squirrels." already i was giddy for where this conversation was heading. "i looooove squirrels!" "then you’ll appreciate all my squirrel art," she said. the wall we were standing beside had three pictures i’d missed when i passed earlier, and there was another inside the bathroom that i’d overlooked. the first picture was a cartoon print of a woman in knee-high boots riding a squirrel like horse as it leapt in the air, created by a local artist in ypsi. the second piece was a card megan received that she had framed. the illustration was of a tree that showed the inside of the rooms like a dollhouse, and squirrels populated each one: in the attic, a squirrel yawned beside a bed. in the room next to it was a storage closet full of acorns with a squirrel hiding behind the pile. on the floor below, a squirrel danced with headphones on as a record player spun. in another section, two squirrels sat in wing-back chairs playing chess. on the ground floor, a squirrel in an apron carried a tray of muffins, while in the "woodshop" another squirrel made a birdhouse out of an acorn. outside of the house tree, more squirrels gathered and socialized. "i’ve always love this card because it reminds me of 'the berenstain bears,'" she gushed. "ohmigod!" i shouted excitedly. "yes! i totally forgot about those books, i loved them as a kid." megan pointed to the third piece. "a friend of mine made that for me." a squirrel was stretched out, it’s tail curving above its body. "is this a combination of cross-stitch and embroidery?" "i’m not sure," megan said. "i’m only a beginner in both," i said. "but it sure looks like it." the squirrel was cross-stitched in a variety of brown and cream threads, but part of it had black embroidery around the body to give shadow. along the borders of the fabric were embroidered flowers. "this is beautiful and elaborate; your friend is very talented." "it probably took her about three months to complete." inside the bathroom, megan proudly showed me another print, a photograph of two cartoon squirrels beneath the umbrella petals of a daisy. it was a chalk illustration someone had drawn on a sidewalk; the center of the flower was a water curb valve. the scene made me think of someone i loved; i snapped pictures of all her prints so i could share it with them. in the living room, megan pointed out all her squirrel ornaments on the tree. "one year for halloween i went dressed as snow white and the seven squirrels," she said. turns out, megan and i used to live in the same neighborhood. she was on fernwood back when i lived on oakwood and she also had a special squirrel friend for a time. i pulled out my phone and showed her my pictures of george_bush. she pulled out her phone and showed me pictures of spot. we were like proud squirrel parents fawning over their cuteness. "do you ever miss spot now that you don’t live there anymore?" i asked her. "all the time," megan said. "you know, i’ve often worried about leaving george," i began. "i’ve wondered if i should ask erin to go over when i’m out of town to feed her." i was half-joking. megan laughed uproariously. "that’s so great! could you imagine? 'i’m squirrel-sitting for a friend of mine'!" 211220 ... raze i got to wish them a merry_christmas last saturday and a happy_new_year today. it's hard to believe there was a time when maybe one or two of them would come out to say hello to us in the course of a walk if we were lucky. now there are almost twenty squirrels who come running the second they see us, sometimes six or seven at a time. our own little furry welcoming committee. haven't seem jimmy around in a while, but his influence is everywhere. i saw newsom slide two peanuts into her mouth at once. then little guy did the same thing. butterscotch was doing some more insulation work today. again, she spat out the leaves she had in her mouth when she saw us. red tail is a little shit-disturber, but i think deep down he just wants to be loved. i asked newsom what her plans were for the new_year. she wouldn't say. but i think she has some good ideas. 220101 ... raze little guy might be getting just a little bit bigger. there's no question about the size of his heart. i watched him change course when he was on his way over to grab a peanut. he saw a dog without a leash and made a run for the nearest tree. it wasn't an act of self-preservation. he climbed halfway to the top of a knotted old oak and started barking, his tail churning with an almost violent energy as he sounded the alarm for the rest of the park's most vulnerable residents. when he saw the dog had no interest in him or any of his brothers and sisters in arms, he ran back over to me. "you're a good guy, little guy," i said, before tossing him a morning snack. he tore into it with something that looked like joy. 220113 ... unhinged were frolicking in the warm weather. i crossed paths with a particularly bouncy little guy on my way that made me stop to watch. i waited longer than they thought i would and all of a sudden a little squirrel head popped from around the tree, the ears erect as if to say 'keep it moving lady' i laughed and started back up along my way 220113 ... raze we buried little_guy yesterday. the remaining six of the magnificent seven — the group of squirrels he played and ran and ate with — gathered in the place where he died and remembered his heart. no matter how large he might have grown if he'd lived long enough to make a lie out of the name i gave him, that majestic muscle was always going to be too big for his body. two months is barely a life at all, but he made every one of those days count. he died the way he liked to eat, with his back pressed against a tree. it was the same tree he climbed to send out his distress signal a little over a week ago. burying him there wasn't an option. the ground wouldn't budge. we found a place beside the path where the dirt was more amenable. we marked the spot where he was laid to rest with a cinder block from our backyard. a temporary headstone until we have something better to put there. the day he died, my dreams abandoned me. i've had nights when i didn't sleep well enough to remember much of anything. this wasn't like that. i could feel there was nothing there. why should i dream if he couldn't anymore? last night the dreams returned. in one that didn't last long enough to leave much of a mark on my memory, i held out a peanut for a black squirrel and he took it straight from my hand. i couldn't tell if it was little_guy, but i like to think it was his way of telling me he's okay. today the cinder block was gone. someone who had some use for it must have taken it. they didn't know why it was there. in its place was what looked like a green shoot. life where no life should have been. a tiny miracle. kind of like little_guy. 220122 ... raze all the peanuts i tossed sank deep into the snow, leaving small hollows in the places where they fell. q, never the most demonstrative member of the magnificent six, buried his face in the blanket of white that stretched out all around him. he gathered what he could in his hands, straightened his spine, and threw it into the air, showering himself with cold, tasteless sugar. he looked up at me with his snow-kissed face. he didn't need to name what he felt. i felt it too. the sun took the sting out of the cold. even the wind was in a generous mood. the morning was more beautiful than anything we'd been promised. red tail came down from what i'll always think of as little guy's tree, and i watched him eat his breakfast, a wooden axis heavy with history at his back, snow balancing on the tip of his nose, all the majesty and fragility of his life right there in his dichromatic eyes. 220126 ... kerry i wish i could meet these squirrels. 220126 ... unhinged i got shelled peanuts for little shit; i will make the squirrels around here obese like the squirrels in my grandpa's yard when i was a kid 220127 ... raze i want to give them all miniature space heaters and little coats and knit caps to keep them warm through this erratic winter. but i know they'd just look at me funny, thinking, "these things ... these things are not food." 220130 ... raze the pecans and walnuts we brought as a gift for our little friends were a hit. i've never seen newsom eat with that kind of enthusiasm. even the elusive brown-brown came down from his tree and showed off that gorgeous tail of his. word spreads fast in these parts. the sun didn't melt the snow altogether, but it took a little something off the top. the magnificent six all shared the same tree, three balancing on branches and three on the ground, while newsom sat in the middle of the path making happy purring sounds. 220201 ... raze they were all cozied up inside their trees this morning. after all the snow we got last night, i don't blame them. we left some food around some of their favourite trees, just in case they decided to brave the cold and do some foraging later on. little_guy would have been out today, even if no one else was. i know it. not even an avalanche would have stopped him from saying hello. 220203 ... unhinged (i purr over pecans and walnuts) 220203 ... raze i had a feeling they'd be out today. that feeling was born in me when i was standing_at_an_upstairs_window watching a pair of squirrels follow each other down the front of a tree on the opposite side of my street, head trailing back like a second tail. if those two were willing to leave the comfort of their homes in search of food, i thought the_magnificent_six and some of my other furry friends might do the same. i was right. charlie tried to sneak a few walnuts when i was feeding red tail. i had to remind him he was a golden retriever and we had bones for him. he head-butted my leg, which was his way of saying, "thanks, man. sometimes i forget." 220205 ... raze the snow that hadn't turned to ice was hard enough that the nuts i threw skipped instead of sinking. it made things easier for everyone. when we were leaving, newsom, patches, and red tail all ran through the fence to see us off. the three of them got a few more walnuts for their trouble. red tail eyed a brown egg that's been sitting in the snow for the past two weeks. in the beginning there were six eggs, but someone stepped on one of them, and the other four are either buried or gone now. i knew what he was thinking. "will this thing fit in my mouth?" he moved like he was going to try and pick it up a few times before settling on a nut instead, munching a few feet away from me while i climbed in the car to warm my cold face. 220210 ... raze the park was a skating rink today. the city salts the path and the bordering sidewalks when there's no ice anywhere. when the whole world is frozen, they're nowhere to be found. i watched a truck show up long enough to grab a single scoop of snow from the side of the road before disappearing. so there was that. the ice didn't stop four of our friends from forming a furry little welcoming committee. they either recognize our car now, or they know our voices. maybe both. newsom, q, patches, and a new grey squirrel i've started calling curly all ran through the stone and wrought-iron fence to greet us as soon as we'd finished parking. after we said our hellos, they ran back inside the park and waited for us to start our rounds. they appreciate tradition just as much as we do. 220212 ... raze i think this must be the first winter some of them have ever seen. curly and a few of the others don't seem to understand how snow works yet. instead of stopping on the paved path where it's easier to spot fallen food, they'll run across it before peering up at us with bewildered snow-speckled faces. we won't move on until everyone's been fed. even if it takes a while. newsom's been here before, though. she tucks walnuts into the vast glacial carpet that surrounds her, knowing what she can't find now will reveal itself when spring comes to make a river of this strange brittle fabric. 220215 ... raze as cold as it was out there today, it was still warm enough to melt all the patches of ice that had taken up residence on the grass. wavy, scarface, and a few of the others couldn't decide if they wanted to leap over the lagoons or try to find a way around them. curly looked at me, then at the puddle between us that must have been an ocean to him, and ran through it as fast as he could without a second thought. his reward was a hill of almonds. 220217 ... raze i do head counts now. just to make sure everyone's still there. 220224 ... raze we were walking through the parking lot when someone said, "you've got two squirrels on your tail." it was a man sitting in his jeep. no one we knew. he was smiling. we turned around. just before the place where grass becomes concrete, sniper and greyson were standing beside each other, looking up at us. we laughed and tossed them some walnuts. newsom was bolder than that and impossible to miss. she did this thing she does sometimes where she follows us almost the entire length of the park. she jumped up on a bench and sat there for a while. just for something to do. i stopped walking and we stared at each other. "you're crazy, newsom," i said. "never change." 220301 ... raze two images i wish i'd captured with something less erratic than the camera in my mind: boxer and scarface standing on lesions time has turned into small burls, with newsom straddling the fork above them, the three of them eating in staggered harmony on the same tree. patches and auburn resting beside each other on the same branch of a different tree, a few feet above my head, locking eyes with me before running down the front of the trunk, one after the other. butterscotch has an incredible built-in gps system. if i overshoot the mark and a snack sails past her, she'll pivot and catch it before it hits the ground. with patches, it's a different story. she doesn't have any trouble seeing us. but she struggles to find what's right in front of her. saturday morning, a walnut bounced off the top of her head after she missed a few that were inches away. she almost missed that one too. i think she might be farsighted. i keep forgetting to call a local optical store to see about having new prescription lenses put in my favourite frames. i kind of want to ask if they'd consider scheduling an eye exam for a squirrel. i think patches would look stylish in tea shades. 220307 ... raze i don't see curly. i call his name, and he appears, a one-pound apparition scampering down the tree he favours near the front gate. in another part of the park, i feed a group of grey squirrels and ask them if they've seen red tail. i'm worried about him. he hasn't been around lately. i look up, and there he is. he looks as surprised to see me as i am to see him. i ask him how they all got through the windstorm that brought in this cold front, and his eyes answer: the same way we get through everything else. with as much grace as our lives will allow. 220308 ... raze there's no one around. "hold on," my dad says. "let me try something." he walks up to a tree a few of our friends live in. he knocks on the trunk three times. like it's their front door. because it is. i don't hear anything. he backs up and waits. within seconds, patches, auburn, and brownie are crawling out of their dreys and shaking the sleep from their legs. they were dreaming just a minute ago. now we all get to wake up together. 220310 ... raze brownie is the one who has trouble finding food. i was confusing her with patches. they look similar, but brownie is a little darker. her face is a little wearier. she tries so hard. she was hanging off the side of the tree she shares with auburn. red tail was resting a little higher up, nestled in the junction of the crown. "okay, brownie," i said. "this is a walnut. see?" she looked at me. she saw. "i'm going to throw it right to you. ready?" i got as close as she would let me. i tossed the nut underhanded. it floated in front of her face before it fell. her eyes followed it down to the ground. then her body did the same. she got it on her first try. red tail shot me a look of disbelief. "you see, red tail?" i said. "all things are possible." 220312 ... raze wavy tried to tell me something. i couldn't work out what it was. he sounded excited. brownie hunted down a walnut almost as soon as it touched the ground. then she did it again. i asked her and auburn to let red_tail know i was around. they didn't know where he was. i had to find him myself. my eyes caught the crimson ripple of his tail. he stood alone in a tree on a hill near willistead manor. i walked half the width of the park to get to him. the nut i threw his way ricocheted off an exposed lateral root and his mouth met it mid-flight. i could still see him when i was leaving, camouflaged by a conifer that'll outlive both of us, invisible but for the pigment that gives him his name. 220319 ... tender_square (right now, i'm watching a black squirrel posed on the peak of my neighbor's roof, doing it's best impression of a furry weather vane.) 220319 ... raze there were robins everywhere. they didn't waste their time looking for worms in the cold grass. they were happy just to see some sunshine. they weren't afraid of us or the squirrels. we all walked together and got on with the strangely beautiful ballet of our day. newsom, curly, and scarface followed us for almost a mile, a ragtag trio of hilarity hellbent on amassing as many walnuts as they could. they know by now they don't have to ask us for anything. we're glad to give them whatever we have. newsom made a one-handed catch that would have made odell beckham jr. proud. i watched her eat with the gothic leg of a bench at her back and told her i loved her. 220322 ... raze auburn steadied herself on the weakest part of a high branch that was almost too thin to support her. the wind weighed it down and threatened to snap it where she stood. i saw fear in her face when she looked at me, but she moved without hesitation, an aerialist risking injury for a chance to make her mark on the morning. she walked to the edge of the hand that held her, waited for one fibrous finger to touch another, and shifted her weight to the limb of the adjacent tree so she could get to where i was. when she was safe in the mud with me, i threw her a walnut and a peanut. she eased the large oval seed into her mouth in front of its smaller furrowed step-sibling, settled down on a makeshift parapet outside of her home, and bit into what was hers while watching blood-red birds search for something still living they could swallow. 220325 ... raze red_tail keeps craning his neck, trying to catch everything i lob his way while it's airborne. he can't quite pull it off. i tell him not to feel bad. i can't catch a walnut in my mouth either. i watch him eat for a while. then i leave him in peace. every few steps i turn and grab a few more snapshots with my mind. scan the area for any dogs without leashes. when i'm almost at the parking lot, i look over my shoulder one last time. he's finished eating. he's staring at me from forty feet away, still as a stone. i'd ask him what he's up to, but i already know. it's the same thing i'm doing. he's watching me. to make sure i'm safe. 220329 ... raze butterscotch was most of the way down her tree when she saw a man standing on the path with two dogs. one of them kept barking. at everything. "cut it out, colby," the man said. "you're embarrassing us." we built a human shield around her. she looked at the dog. she looked at us. then back at the dog. then at us again. when she understood we weren't going to leave until we knew she was safe, she came down. we watched her eat. the man moved on. a black squirrel i'd never seen before met us in the parking lot and followed us all the way back to the park. we were instant friends. he stood on his back legs and made himself as tall as he could. i think he was trying to make us laugh. it worked. "you're a nut," i told him. "what are we going to call you?" "how about frederick?" my dad said. "that's got a ring to it. he's got a tail like a black feather. frederick feathertail. what do you think, frederick?" he seemed to like the name just fine. 220404 ... raze i saw frederick from a distance, but he didn't see me. newsom matched me step for step as i led her away from an overactive little yappy dog whose human likes to hold him up so he can see where the squirrels hide from the noises he makes, teaching him to torment anything smaller than he is. one bully building another. i moved. she moved. i stopped. she stopped. last night i had a dream she and curly and two of the others walked more than twenty miles to find me in essex county. now she was letting me know she would follow me anywhere. patches dangled from a willowy branch just starting to sprout a bit of colour. it looked like something out of a military rope-climbing exercise gone wrong until she somehow flipped herself over, running through a litany of corde lisse skills and craning her neck to snatch the terminal bud from the tip. while she chewed on a few walnuts in the grass with auburn, i heard another squirrel chirping about a dog or a hawk he thought he saw. i couldn't pinpoint the source of the sound. when i was on my way out, the lookout came down from his post. it was red_tail. 220405 ... raze frederick busies himself burying half of his late breakfast. it looks like he's giving the ground chest compressions. then he climbs on top of the curb and eats what he isn't saving for later. brownie catches a walnut almost before it bounces. she's getting good at this. patches follows us from one side of the park to the other. she makes a happy sighing sound like newsom does sometimes, only louder. another squirrel i don't recognize decides to get in on the action. he isn't shy at all. he looks angular and jazzy to me. he has a soulful face. i call him monk. after thelonious. in recognition of his brilliant corners, i sing him a bit of "ba-lue bolivar ba-lues-are". i think he approves. he holds two shelled nuts in his mouth and looks at me, his eyes wide with wonder. after a dog that's chased him up a tree has moved on to sniff out some other dog's piss so he can cover it with his own, i find monk resting above my head in a knotted nest of branches. a home some bird built before abandoning it. he leaps from one broken tangle to the trunk of the next tree and gets back down to business. my dad throws him a milk bone to see what he'll do. he turns it around in his mouth. testing it. then he buries it. a treat for another time. newsom is as beautiful as ever. she's in a burying mood today too. red_tail has lit off on his own again. he seems agitated until he sees me. then he calms down. i want to tell him he does the same thing for me. instead, i watch the wind make a banderole of his tail and i tell him, "stay red, red_tail. stay red forever." 220409 ... raze google questions asks, "are squirrels emotions?" i think the answer is a pretty obvious "yes". 220413 ... tender_square while walking yesterday, i saw a squirrel dart out into the street while a car took the corner sharply at high speed. "no, squirrel! no!" i shrieked. and i watched that furry frolicker quickly switchback to the curb and across a lawn, and then travel mid-way up a tree trunk before pausing. "i'm so glad you listened!" i called out as i passed, waving and smiling before we both continued on our separate routes. 220413 ... tender_square i have become a brothel madam, running cassie’s house of fornication. george_bush tried acrobatic tree sex with another squirrel and they fell into the ivy underbrush, their tails and bodies twirling into a helix of love. and in the background, two rabbits gave chase to each other, white tails in the air like they just didn’t care, while the robins flew above in pairs searching for branches to support their quickies. 220415 ... raze they've been kind of scarce lately. i'm not sure why. i haven't seen newsom in two weeks now. that just doesn't happen. over this last little bit, it's been patches, and auburn, and sniper. sometimes frederick and brownie show up. that's about it. we got a better turnout the other day. auburn and brownie both ate while hanging upside_down from the same tree. frederick had a chat with wavy. he was in a talkative mood again. and i saw a familiar tail in a spot no one seems to visit anymore — the turf where the magnificent_six once spent their mornings and afternoons. "fucking red_tail," i said. "how the hell are you, man?" he ate two walnuts at the same time, which told me, "better now that you're here." "me too," i said. i wished him a happy_easter. after i walked away, he ran around the tree that acted as a buffer between his body and the short-haired blonde poodle that kept trying to stare him down. he stood there and watched me watching him. i asked sniper where everyone disappeared to. he couldn't say. when it was time to go, he stood on the curb in the parking lot. his eyes asked me to stay. "i'll be back," i said. "i'll always come back for you." 220418 ... raze brownie tests the ground in seven different places, searching for the perfect spot to bury her first peanut of the day. on her eighth try, she says, "that'll do." she digs out just enough of the dirt to hide what's hers. later, she stands high in the tree she shares with auburn, the two of them huddled so close together their shoulders touch, and the three of us lock eyes. i tell them the rest of the bag of walnuts is theirs if they want it. they race each other to the bottom and claim their reward for showing up on a frigid morning fraught with flakes of snow too guarded to make anything of themselves. spring can reveal itself anytime it feels like it. we'll be here. waiting. 220419 ... raze frederick stands at the epicenter of a bed of daisies, a bright black spot in a field of self-fertilizing flowers. auburn and red_tail run up the forked paths of two different trees when they see a labradoodle headed their way. i stay with them until the dog is gone. "i won't let anything happen to you," i say. "i promise." they come back down and relax with thick boles at their backs. patches chases auburn after she gets too close when there's food on the ground. auburn does the same thing to brownie. i've never seen brownie try to intimidate anyone. she's too sweet for that. "fate has brought us here," i tell patches. "the question is, now that we're together, what are we to do?" her face tells me what her voice can't say: we eat. she feasts on the largest unshelled walnut i've ever seen, and i fortify my soul with the sight of the wind curling her tail up over the back of her head — a grey sail to keep her docked here long enough so we can mark each other's hearts with something worth holding onto. 220421 ... raze and then_there_were_four. 220428 ... raze patches has developed a technique i like to call "the double barrel". she grabs two walnuts and eats one while the second nut sits loaded and waiting beneath it in her agile little hands. away from the park, i caught two black squirrels exploring my backyard when i was doing laundry. first there was only one. i opened the door and chucked four peanuts into the uncut grass. i didn't want to get too close and scare him. he was surprised, but he didn't run away. when i looked again, he was eating on the top rail of the fence, watching his cohort forage for what he'd left behind. a pair of ramblers steeling themselves for the slow encroachment of sunset. new friends. maybe. i hope. 220429 ... raze it was just patches today. she didn't show herself until we were about to take off. a fragment of yellow leaf clung to her right shoulder. i fished the best walnuts i could find out of the bag and sang a bit of "sunshine of your love" for her. she looked up at me while she ate. "thanks for still being here," i said. 220430 ... raze the rain did something strange to brownie's coat. it made her look like she got a haircut. she swapped places with auburn, snacking from the balcony while her roommate hung out on the rain-slicked grass. some creatures wilt when they get wet. some people do too. auburn just got more beautiful. i'd never seen so much red in her tail. i told patches i wanted to sit with her, but the weather had other ideas. and still, i was tempted, damp as my ass would have been by the time we finished talking. tomorrow i aim to try again. 220504 ... raze i see patches before i'm even out of the car. she meets my eyes from ten yards away and waits for me to join her on her front porch. i find red_tail exploring the underside of a bench. he takes a walnut and runs to the nearest tree so he can eat with his body upended, turning earth to viridescent sky. the mange beneath his right elbow is getting worse. the missing fur makes him look like a stuffed animal that's been damaged by an angry child, but the tint of his scarlet tail is more dazzling than ever. i knock on auburn and brownie's tree. they come to the door with sleep still in their eyes. brownie scratches her back and washes her hands before she greets me. i ease my body down onto the grass like i told patches i would. look at my hands. my knuckles are mottled with mud. i feel smaller and less agile than i'm used to being. "this is a little more difficult than i thought it would be," i say. she gives me a look that says, "welcome to my world." 220506 ... raze in a dream, a woman i've never met told me what happened to the squirrels i don't see anymore. she said a wolf tore through the park one night and killed them all. i imagined newsom, outmatched and doomed, determined to stand her ground and fight until all the blood and breath had left her. i'm grateful for the ones who've held on. for auburn, who finds a way to stow a walnut in front of the shelled peanut already in her mouth. for patches. brave as she is, she flinches whenever i open my fist to feed her. every moment she's alive is a leap of faith. today she doesn't draw back. not once. for brownie, who i'm lucky enough to catch laughing sometimes when she thinks no one's watching. and for red_tail, who makes me walk half a mile to reach him. he keeps moving away from me without meaning to. i won't let him disappear without making contact. when i'm near enough that i know he'll hear my voice, i call his name. he turns to look at me. for a moment we stand and study each other. then he runs to deaden the distance between us, flooding my soul with all the colour he carries, and i find the strength to smile again. 220507 ... raze i keep thinking about sniper standing on that strip of concrete and staring at me with something like sadness in his face. the longer i go without seeing him, the heavier the memory grows in my mind, and i start to think maybe that was his way of saying goodbye. you see things in the dark sometimes when you're in and out of sleep. i used to see insects. surveillance equipment. corpses. all kinds of creepy shit. but nothing like that has happened in a while now. last night i saw a black squirrel on top of one of my bookshelves. he was standing on all fours. there was a bit of red in his tail. he was smiling at me. it took me a minute to work out who it was. "little_guy," i said. the same way i used to say his name when i saw him in the park. he was as big as he was ever going to be. he was happy. he was beautiful. he didn't fade on me right away. he took his time so i could take him in. if we go on in some way after the life we know has fled from us, maybe that dark crack just before the door closes on our waking dreams is where everything we've ever loved is still alive. and maybe that wasn't my tired mind short-circuiting to show me something pretty. maybe it really was him stopping by to see me one more time. i closed my eyes and fell back asleep. i didn't dream of him. but it comforted me to know he was there. 220509 ... raze another picture i wish i'd taken: patches, flanked by dandelions, smirking when i said, "in the absence of so many of the others, you've become my new favourite. but don't tell anyone i said that." i think my secret's safe with her. 220512 ... raze i met someone new. i didn't think that would happen again. he was grey and hanging from the trunk of a tree a few steps from the spot where the_magnificent_six used to congregate. there was a woman sitting on a blanket with her little white dog. the squirrel didn't look at the dog, and the dog didn't look at him. he looked at me. he was talking to me. almost like he knew me. i talked back. he came down when he saw i had food. i called him chatterbox. his tail was like curly's, only there was a second layer of darker fur. it looked like shredded carpet. a second grey squirrel crept across an adjacent tree. she looked like chatterbox with a more robust tail. i decided they were siblings. i named her sister moonshine. figured her for a supertramp fan. there was a dead black squirrel a few feet away. its face was a sad secret guarded by a strip of bark. i thought maybe it was auburn. but i've never seen her in that part of the park. i couldn't make myself lift up the ribbon of broken brown skin to see if i was right. i didn't want to believe it was anyone i knew. i'd put money on one of the other squirrels moving that bark there, covering their fallen friend the best way they knew how. red_tail would do a thing like that. patches appeared when i was hoping she would. right when i was willing her to be there. sometimes i think she knows when i need to see her most. when i found auburn in the usual place, i sighed almost hard enough to blow myself back the way i came. brownie was the last one on the ground. i could still see the three of them eating together when i was leaving. i turned my head and walked without watching where i was going. just to keep them in my line of sight a little longer. 220516 ... raze and then there were none, except for the dead one that hasn't yet been eaten by flies, and a black squirrel i hadn't seen before. he scurried away and glared at me when i got too close. he didn't know me. he didn't want to know me. i left him some peanuts and walked away. 220519 ... raze sometimes_they_come_back. 220528 ... raze there's a bluegrass song playing on cjam right now. a man keeps singing about the patches on his heart. it's supposed to be a sad song, but he can't conceal the pleasure it gives him to roll those words around on his tongue. yesterday i saw patches, newsom, chatterbox, and a few new faces in the park. sometimes art imitates life. other times it just shows up at the right time to serve as the soundtrack for what you're living through. 220529 ... raze on the most oppressive day of this fugitive spring, when anyone with any sense is inside hiding from the heat, i see more of my friends than i have in months. patches encroaches on butterscotch's territory, forming false teeth out of walnuts and mugging for the camera. a few black squirrels who aren't familiar to me introduce themselves. they don't trust me. not yet. but they're curious. chatterbox complains about the weather to a spellbound starling. red_tail cools off beneath a bench made of stone while wavy stands in the sun, unthreatened by its brilliant scowl. newsom takes food from my fingers for the fourth time, closing her eyes to make herself brave. the changes in her body tell me she's been nursing pups. i don't need to see her with her young to know what kind of mother she is. i know her heart. in the place where little_guy first ran to meet me, three juveniles with dark coats are awestruck explorers. life must be as singular and strange to them as it was to me once, when i was almost as small as they are now. whatever reverence i might have lost or mislaid, they give it back to me, because they let me see the world through their eyes. 220601 ... raze on thursday they were setting up tents and outhouses for art in the park — a weekend of food, wine, beer, live music, and vendors selling arts and crafts. fat, blank-faced men sat on riding lawnmowers, feigning competence. auburn wasn't fooled. she dangled from her back legs like a bat just to prove she could and cracked open the crust of a peanut, smirking. newsom eyed a city truck with derision. orange numbers and letters and square brackets were spray-painted onto the grass, reserving space for paltry pavilions not yet erected. 308. 310. 313B. 319A. i traced out some words of my own with my shoes to commemorate the faces i saw. chatterbox. sister moonshine. wavy. patches. red_tail. the dead one was still there. decomposition had levelled its carcass into a ratty bathroom mat that wouldn't be made clean again. i thought about stopping by on saturday, but i knew everyone i wanted to see would be ensconced in their trees, admiring paintings and blown glass sculptures and talking themselves out of impulse buys. we walked in optimist memorial park instead. there were a lot of black squirrels. no grey ones. most of them ran away as soon as they saw us. i expected that. one guy bucked the trend and accepted some nuts without backing off. his tail looked like it had been docked. i called him stubs. i don't know how often i'll be back that way, but i hope i get to see him again. 220606 ... raze i look back over my shoulder when we're already past the place butterscotch used to be, and there's patches. waiting. "how'd you know that?" my dad says. "how'd you know she would be there?" all i can say is sometimes hope lives long enough to see itself rewarded. auburn and brownie emerge from their tree for the first time in almost a month. a teenager says to his friend, "i was literally right over there." i look at patches and say, "you hear that? he was literally over there. he wasn't there in the figurative sense. what do you make of that revelation, patches?" she barks at a black dog. he won't say anything back. he doesn't even have the decency to look at her. the bastard. scarface reappears. there's so much red in his new tunic. he's too pretty for his name now. he leaves the gated grounds to bury his riches across the street. when he comes back, he considers eating from my hand before deciding he isn't ready. not yet. newsom is. she takes three walnuts and a peanut and follows me halfway around the park. just like old times, but with a new wrinkle i never thought i'd find nestled in the middle of the hardy fabric we call our lives. 220611 ... raze the first few times i met sister moonshine, she was pretty jumpy. she'd dart out from wherever she was hiding long enough to grab some grub, and then she'd run away. yesterday she came down from her tree as soon as she saw us. i heard the skitter of her claws on bark before i knew she was there. even when there were dogs in the area, she stuck around. a little later, red_tail and patches ate on separate sides of the same path. "you guys stay cool," i said. "it's supposed to be a scorcher tomorrow." i worry about them on humid days like this. i hope they've got some good a/c in those dreys of theirs. tomorrow we're bringing water and a little dish with us, just in case anyone wants a drink of something cold. 220615 ... raze i was convinced i wouldn't see anyone on a day like today. i was wrong. newsom kept to the shade as much as she could, but the second leg of this two-day heat_event didn't stop her from braving the hot pavement to catch up with me when she finished what i'd left for her to eat. she sniffed at her new water dish but wouldn't drink from it. she had an itch on her face she couldn't scratch. she massaged her chin against the bark of a tree to get some relief. she licked the fur on her forearms and spread out on all fours, flattening herself into a furry pancake on a plate of rope-like roots to shed her body heat. she chattered her teeth at sister moonshine when she thought she wanted to swipe one of her nuts. i made the mistake of dumping all the roughage at the bottom of the bag on the ground when i saw red_tail. i figured he would be the last squirrel i saw. i didn't expect auburn to make an appearance. those two got into a serious scrap over the peanut and walnut fragments that mottled the blistering grass. auburn curled her tail over the back of her head and made sounds i'd never heard any animal make before. i didn't have anything left in my hands that was enticing enough to break it up. patches watched from a slight remove and gave me a look that said, "you see what i have to put up with?" 220616 ... raze somewhere around the fourteenth time newsom lets me feed her by hand, i start to think i've fucked up. maybe i've made her too tame for her own good. maybe i've let her down by loving her too much. then she spots a dog sniffing at something. the same way she does, only with less conviction. i watch her tense up. she follows the animal with her eyes, readying herself for the nearest thing to flight she'll ever know. she sees nothing else until her would-be adversary is far enough away that he might as well be in another city. i haven't altered who she is. those instincts are still there, bone-deep and sharp as the teeth she uses to break through chassis that would cripple me. she just allows herself to overlook them for a while when i'm around and the coast is clear. 220621 ... raze chatterbox is getting more courageous. and there are little ones about. silver seraphs overhead. i wonder who their parents are. 220624 ... raze he isn't just getting braver. something has shifted. i always had to go to him. now he comes to me. he reminds me more of curly all the time. it's the way he takes a few steps forward, stops, and then takes a few more. always considering. always speaking, even when he's silent. he doesn't back off when he's eating the way he used to. maybe he really is curly, grown up and grown into a new name. "keep chattering," i tell him. "don't ever stop." two wire walkers i haven't seen before leap from one weak branch to another, feigning pursuit as pretext for their dance into togetherness. everything they touch trembles. i tell myself they're following me. it's the other way around. i lose them in a dense collage of leaves and shadow. i commit as much of their artistry as i can to memory and walk on, a tuning fork keeping constant pitch. 220629 ... raze newsom stands atop a mountain of wood chips, surveying her kingdom. twenty times she's eaten from my hands now, giving me the gift of her deepest trust. a woman wearing a black hijab walks past me pushing a child in a stroller. she stops to take a picture with her phone. that's the fifth person i've seen struck by the beauty of the squirrel i love best. she leads me to the places where day imitates dusk and the heat isn't so oppressive. she's wise about things like that. she flicks her tail toward the construction workers who've been hacking away at my old high_school for four months straight. they're getting paid almost ten million dollars to replace all the windows and doorframes. the only thing i've seen them do is retouch the masonry and limestone facade. it looks the same as it did when they started. "i'm with you, newsom," i tell her. "that shit drives me nuts too." a grey one who isn't grown yet dashes to safety when she sees me coming. i leave her a few walnuts. "it's there if you want it, baby grey," i say. chatterbox buries every peanut he sees. repasts to revisit on a less fruitful day. patches and auburn dine together, contemplating the intricacies of floof. the last time i see newsom, there's a chestnut in her mouth. something she found on her own steam. she mummifies it so she can come to me and accept what i have to give. i feel her tiny hand touch mine and my kneecaps swear at me under their breath, swollen with gratitude for the friends who've chosen me. 220708 ... raze auburn and sister moonshine got into it on saturday. it wasn't quite up there with the recent spat that had patches and brownie spinning and soaring skyward with ripped-up rhytidome flying around their feet. but it was pretty intense. they ran straight at each other. no hesitation to throw down on either side. auburn struck the first blow. moonshine yelped after feeling the prick of her adversary's teeth. she ran up a tree that was hardly as tall as i am. she found a good place to lick her psychic wounds and sat there staring at the back of auburn's head. seething. she wasn't angry. she was insulted. she waited until auburn let her guard down. then she took off like a grey rocket and sucker punched her with the crest of her skull. i would have tried to separate them with food, but my pockets were empty. we stashed the bag we were carrying in the car after spotting the navy blues of a bowlegged city bylaw-enforcement officer making the rounds. he wasn't there to do anything. the whole point was to be seen. the people he wasn't paying any attention to littered and let their dogs shit all over the place, leaving warm logs for unsuspecting soles to land on. newsom got his attention. he stopped what he wasn't doing and watched us walk together. easy prey, he thought. i saw him before he saw me. i wasn't going to hand him an opportunity to tell himself he'd accomplished something by issuing a meaningless warning. we imagined we were strangers. newsom was just a curious squirrel. i was a photographer. she stood on a stone set deep in the dirt, with a plaque that carried the name of a man who was dead three months after my fifth birthday, and she posed for me. i got some good shots. i always do with her. the officer lost interest and shuffled away. when i was sure he couldn't see us anymore, we fell back into our usual rhythm and my hands slipped into the clusters of cloth that held what i wanted her to have. i'd refuelled, knowing we would find our way back to each other. "you have to live forever, newsom." i said. "promise? and i'll live forever too. and we can keep doing this until the end of time." i know we won't always be here. life doesn't work that way. but we can clutch these moments tight to our chests and bruise our bodies with the map of all our days. and when our memories are nothing more than molecules in an attic that isn't even ours, the cages that kept us from falling to pieces will remember who we were and what we loved best. 220711 ... raze in some of the pictures i took today, they look like they're beaming as they gobble up skinny slices of unpeeled honeycrisp. and they say squirrels can't show emotion through facial expressions. bullshit. i know what i'm looking at. if i can give them back even a fraction of the happiness they've given me — if i can make their too-brief lives better in some small way — i'll have done something right. 220714 ... raze i walk past the place i used to run into butterscotch. i call her name out of habit. nothing. the next time around, she's right there. like she never left. i throw her some walnuts, a peanut, and a sliver of apple. she looks stunned. "yeah," i tell her. "that's all for you." there are two new members of the floof brigade: tiger bomb and dusty. they get a little more daring every time i see them. something incredible is happening to chatterbox's tail. it's still wispy and rope-like where it comes to a point, but the segment that converges with his body has fanned out into a thick, gorgeous tapestry of grey and black. i've never seen anything like it. and goddamn, i wish i could gif this with my brain: newsom breaking into a canter with a mouth full of fruit and a sprig of something brown that fell from one of her neighbour's homes balanced between her ears. "i see you, little monkey," i say, and wait for her to meet me where the conifers cast shadows strong enough to pin us where we stand. 220722 ... raze something i was able to make into an actual gif: newsom offering a very deliberate wink while munching in the middle of the path. things that somehow escaped my notice until now: - the small patch of burgundy fur above newsom's nose. - the underside of the part of red_tail that gives him his name looks like a quill. - wavy might be a girl. it's a good thing i've given most of these squirrels gender-neutral names. i would hate for anyone to feel hard done by in that department. 220725 ... tender_square there’s four that visit now, chasing after my heels as i unlock the front door, the chime of my keys their trigger. george leads the floof brigade, though i’m not sure who the others are, they tend to rotate. she is brave enough to approach and collects walnuts from my palm. the rest are skittish, circling, suspicious. i hold my hand still, avoid eye contact, and they sniff and scoot. one ambles up the walk, keeping distance. i’ve taken to bowling down the lane, rolling a swirly shell across the concrete stones for the squirrel to catch. they take it and hop away, chewing under the bumper for protection. the hesitant ones tend to miss underhanded throws to where they watch in the grass, tall turf hides their prospects. the routine is the same: each squirrel gets their own individual walnut. then, i leave a bevy of almonds, hazelnuts and peanuts for them to split amongst themselves in the turtle dish. sometimes the chipmunks and birds take what isn’t intended for them. “george,” i say, passing her a second walnut, “just because these other squirrels come around now doesn’t mean i’ll forget about you; you’re my favourite,” i assure her. “i will always take care of you.” she looks at me from the side and i swear she gives a slight nod to say she believes it. 220728 ... raze "i have a painting of you beside my bed now," i tell newsom. "no other living creature has ever held that distinction." she's in a playful mood today. she skips across the ridge of a bench i wouldn't sit on if both my legs were broken and makes like she's about to bury something outside of the park before ducking back inside the gate. two furtive friends the colour of night who've never taken anything from me before decide they're willing to give me a chance. "thanks for trusting me," i say. i watch wavy leap into a bundle of glorified twigs, chomping as the flimsy platform bobs beneath her body. "i'm calling you a girl now," i tell her. "feel free to correct me if i'm wrong." scarface gets so close he's almost standing on my shoe. i hold out a peanut. he backs away at the last second. i tell him it's okay. i'll be here when he's ready. he sets up shop on the rutted road of a raised root. water pools in the crook of its arm when it rains. "that was one of little guy's favourite spots," i say, and he looks pleased. he looks proud. 220729 ... raze what i drop for scarface embeds itself in a tangle of honeysuckle and clover. he can see it, but he can't reach it. he whimpers. such a high and hopeless sound. it startles me. i'm about to free the bit of food myself when he cranes his neck and finds a way to get at what can't be grasped by moving in a straight line. i hear squawking from somewhere above my head. somehow i know it's chatterbox. i say his name and he relinquishes his perch to meet me on the greenery. he slinks toward me. no one else walks like that. so careful but unafraid. "look at your tail," i say. "it's so beautiful." it looks like a silver flame. a hawk cuts slow circles into the sky, scoping out the scene below. i tell it to fuck_off and leave my friends alone. i balance a treat on the lip of my hand and feel the damp magic of newsom's nose brush against my upturned palm. patches steps through a square in the gate, leaving the confines of the park so she can catch me before i get to the car. "did you come out here to see me off?" i say. "here. something to remember me by." she casts her eyes heavenward as walnuts rain down around her feet. 220805 ... raze the district that hasn't seen much action since there was still snow on the ground explodes with life as summer readies its last stand. tiger bomb, dusty, scarface, chatterbox, skeeter the second, and moonshine form a new magnificent_six. they become seven whenever patches feels like joining the crew. they eat almost faster than i can serve them. east of here, where the community scatters and thins, someone comes bounding toward me at full speed. they cover the entire width of the park. it has to be newsom. but newsom's already beside me. it's brownie. she's never done anything like this before. i've never seen her anywhere near here. not once. she's audacious enough to approach when i'm holding out something for newsom to pull from the space between my thumb and forefinger. "you're taking your life in your hands, brownie," i tell her. newsom outranks everyone here. she's the alpha squirrel. she growls. it's something that starts in the back of her throat. like a baby dinosaur trying to sound dangerous before she knows what meanness is. she warns brownie, but she doesn't snap at her. i think she respects her guts. wavy holds a crabapple in her mouth and weighs her options before spitting it out so she can chew on a slice of honeycrisp instead. baby grey is getting longer and rounder. her fur has grown darker. but she hasn't warmed to me yet. "what were your parents like?" i ask newsom. "what were you like when you were little? were you always so free of fear? or was it something you had to grow into?" her brown eyes tell me she doesn't remember. and it doesn't really matter. what's important is who we are now. i tell her it's my birthday next tuesday. i hope i see her then. i hope we get to celebrate together. 220811 ... raze acorns are everywhere. i feel the rough cups of their bodies crack and crumble beneath my feet. and there are so many black squirrels these days. it's getting hard to tell who's who. "name tags," i tell them. "you guys gotta start wearing them. it would help me out a lot. think about it, huh?" they all seem to trust me now. even the ones i thought would always be a little wary. the one holdout is baby grey. she doesn't run from me like she used to, but she still isn't sure what i'm all about. i can tell by the way she looks at me. bailey amaretto is brand new. she has a toffee-tinted belly and dark markings around her mouth that make me think she might be related to brownie. she acts like she's known me all her life. i hope i'm lucky enough to call her a friend for a good chunk of mine. i hold out a peanut for scarface. he touches it with his nose. twice. then he backs away. "you're so brave," i tell him. "we'll get there. don't worry." newsom doesn't need any coaxing. i show her half a walnut and let her come to me. she sniffs my index finger. then my thumb. the wind tries to blow us both away. we refuse to be moved. this is the eighty-second time she's let me feed her by hand. for the first time, she doesn't close her eyes. she doesn't even blink. 220818 ... raze newsom sees a green grape and thinks: i know what to do with this. trim the skin. bite into the deeper flesh. then suck out the juice and throw away what isn't essential. she chases scarface up a tree. they hang bat-like from opposite sides of a long brown neck leathered with age, inches apart but invisible to each other. a grey squirrel i'm not sure i have a name for makes a sound i haven't heard before. a piercing plaintive wail. maybe she's a mother who's lost a child. "what happened?" i ask her. she's only lost a crabapple. after admonishing one of the others for stealing what was never taken, she finds what she's missing under uncut blades of grass. cicadas sing through their stomachs as newsom takes the creased seed of a deciduous tree between her teeth. i relax my grip so she can make it hers. "that's the one hundredth time we've done this," i tell her. "thank you for trusting me." she breaks the kernel down into pieces small enough to swallow. i ready another for when she's finished. the sight of her happy is all the sustenance i need. 220829 ... raze i hadn't seen red_tail in over a month, and then there he was, waiting for me outside one of his old haunts on tuesday. "i was just talking about you," i said. so many of the new black squirrels have a bit of red in their billowing sails. i thought maybe his had lost some of its lustre, making it more difficult to distinguish him from the others. or maybe he wasn't with us anymore. i've never been so glad to be so wrong. he's still here. and that tail is just as stunning as it ever was. since then, he's become an honourary member of the new magnificent seven. i can't remember the last time i saw him socialize with anyone. "it's good to have you back," i told him the last time we met, and he caught what i lobbed his way before it had a chance to touch the ground. 220905 ... raze another squirrel gets the better of newsom in a territorial dispute for the first time. i never thought i'd see the day. she leaps over scarface. he times his push just right and forces her to yield with a surprised squeak. he's grown into a formidable foe. some variation on the theme plays out three times, on three different days. she gains the early advantage. he keeps finding ways to trip her up. it's a jarring thing to witness. i feel like i'm watching my child fall and split her lip. i want to reach out and comfort her. but i know it isn't my place. i worry she'll feel diminished. that she'll lose heart and limp off somewhere i can't follow. i should know better. she isn't built that way. she runs scarface off the spot he wants to claim as his turf. backs him down until he can't see any daylight. she stands her ground with a mouth full of faded morning. her eyes follow his shrinking figure as he retreats. someday someone might topple her from her throne. but not today. she's still the queen of all she surveys. 220907 ... raze there's a dead squirrel on its side over there. a grey one. still intact, though insects and the elements will do their best to change that. it isn't like the black one i found four months ago. that one's back has opened up to unveil a skeleton that resembles a network of repurposed plastic vampire fangs. i can't work out where the head used to be. and i don't know where all the organs went. into the ground, i guess. same as the food they chose to bury when they were breathing. i study the grey one. try to work out who they might be. it isn't moonshine. i know her by the white spot above her left eye. a blemish bent into a birthmark by time. it isn't patches. or butterscotch. they both have brown in their bellies i've never seen before. it isn't dusty or tiger bomb. or chatterbox. they're all still with us. and it isn't newsom. i hold out a whole walnut. she doesn't use her hands. she finds a way to pierce its shell with her teeth alone. i keep wishing i could touch her and holding myself back. she lets me get so close. i don't want to betray that trust. her solution is to rub her chin against my hand as she patiently works the nut into her mouth. she's the softest thing i've ever felt. so the dead grey squirrel isn't anyone i know. that doesn't make it any less of a loss. i can't keep track of how many i see on a given day anymore. so many old friends. so many new friends too. one black squirrel has a bit of fire in his tail. he's smaller than the others. bold without being belligerent. he reminds me of little_guy. i call him wee one. an infant eats a crab apple in the fork of a sturdy tree. red_tail runs over to act as a buffer between her and the rest of the world. always looking out for the vulnerable ones. these days, brownie's usually the first to greet me and the last to say goodbye. sometimes i catch her reaching for something that isn't hers yet. she follows me out of the park to see me off. i leave her something to eat and something to hide. "you get back inside when you're finished with that," i tell her. "you're important." they all are. 220922 ... raze a lot of the new faces have become familiar to me by now. this here is someone i know i haven't seen before. he looks just like a grownup version of little_guy. same beige eddies in the permanent midnight of his tail. same open face. same inquisitive spirit. he's skittish at first. i toss him a snack. he takes it. tries it. likes it. then he gets a whole lot more courageous. he's what i never thought i'd get to see. a waking dream that takes my breath away. little big guy. as for newsom, she's agitated. work's been hectic. she tries to take another whole walnut from my hand. in her haste, she bites down on my middle finger hard enough to break the skin. she doesn't mean to. it just happens. i'm left with a curved scratch on the nail above the lunula and a small white flap of flesh i won't be able to see by the time i get home. i've had paper cuts worse than this. the blood pools just the same. "that's okay, newsom," i say. "we all have our bad days. thanks for the badge_of_honour." 221001 ... raze newsom has me worried. something about her seems off. i don't even know what to call it. she isn't aggressive. she isn't apprehensive. i want to say she's lethargic, but i'm not sure that's right either. it's as if her mind is somewhere else. faded like what's left of the wound she gave me. she takes food from my hand three times, but there's no joy in it. she never eats this slow. she never backs away from me when i change my stance. i wish i could ask her what's wrong. maybe she's sick. maybe she's sad. maybe she just didn't get enough sleep last night. maybe the same train that ripped me out of a dream and wouldn't let me fall into another shook her awake before she was ready to open her eyes. she doesn't run after me when i go. she takes a few steps, stops, and watches me. i want to turn around. but i don't want to push her. that look can mean anything for all i care. as long as it isn't goodbye. an hour later, all hell breaks loose. a cavalcade of squirrels squabble over food. she watches from her balcony, a weary saloon owner in the most soulful revisionist western i've ever seen. "you see, newsom?" i say. "this is what happens when you're not down here keeping everyone in line." i hope she knows how necessary she is. a blonde-haired boy sits in a blue wagon, driven by his mother. he fixes me with a smile that won't quit. "hello," he says. "hello. hello. have fun." 221008 ... raze newsom_was_here. 221008 ... raze i've been walking through this park for almost three years now. in all that time, i've only seen five dead squirrels. that's not a lot. when a squirrel knows they're dying, they'll try to make it home. if that isn't in the cards, they'll search for underbrush or a dense bed of leaves to lie down in. somewhere they won't be disturbed. that's why you rarely see them after they've passed, unless they're roadkill. and the reason so many of them die on the road is because they think anything with wheels is a predator. when a larger animal is hunting them, they adopt a serpentine pattern of flight to throw them off. they think they can trick a machine the same way. they don't know a car doesn't have a soul. newsom didn't follow the script. she could have gone anywhere. she picked a spot out in the open where she knew i would find her. right around the place our lives first intersected. in my own back yard, my furry customers call it a night a little after 7:00. when it's closing time, i set a single walnut down in front of the communal water dish. i know no one's going to claim it. i leave it there for another hour anyway. just in case. i do that for newsom now. and for jimmy. and little_guy. and all the other friends i've lost. i know it won't bring them back. but it gives me some small measure of comfort to know there's a bit of food there and something good to drink if they're ever passing through. i'll always leave a light on for the ones i love. 221010 what's it to you? who go blather from