A Furry Good Neighbor

I may not have imaginary friends, but I do tend to accept local wild animals as my good neighbors. One such neighbor is a brown squirrel. If I was quicker with a camera, I'd have a picture of him, but alas, you'll just have to use your imagination. Most would say he's just an average squirrel, but I tend to think he's on the cuter side of the scale. He's scared me half to death on multiple occasions by clinging to the large maple tree that's right beside my sidewalk. Only when I'm about three feet away do I realize something at my eye level is staring at me. I haven't figured out if he's extraordinarily brave or extraordinarily ornery.

A couple weeks ago one of my cats became quite excited at the window. I went to take a look, and saw Mr. Squirrel, nut in mouth, searching for a new hiding spot for his treasure. Instead of looking out in the yard, he had spotted my flower pots. One by one, he checked them out, testing the softness of the dirt. He finally came up on the porch and found one particular pot that he liked. He very carefully parted the flowers, dug a hole, buried the nut, then patted everything back in place (including the flowers) to make sure no one would be the wiser.

It was one of the cutest, funniest things I'd ever seen. I didn't have the heart to scare him away from my flowers, and still haven't dug up the nut. I've noticed a few other holes in the dirt in some of the other pots, but I've just let Mr. Squirrel be.

More recently, a dead squirrel appeared in the street. I didn't even realize it was there until a gentleman in a pickup came by and cleaned it up. I felt terrible. I didn't know if it was Mr. Squirrel or not, but I'd sort of grown attached to the furry little guy, and to think he'd been hit by a car was rather sad. I knew there were plenty of other squirrels around town but they just weren't the same.

I watched out my window for several days, hoping I'd see Mr. Squirrel and prove it was some other poor creature that had been run over. We had several rainstorms, which didn't help much, as no animals came around at all. I began to believe that it really was Mr. Squirrel that I'd seen taken away.

Until yesterday.

Once again, my cat alerted me. I know, I know, you'd probably tell me that I could never tell the difference from one squirrel to the next, but let me believe and be happy, okay? THIS squirrel dared to drink out of a flooded flower pot and even came up on the porch to sniff around. He was so confident about it being his territory, that I was convinced it was, indeed, my Mr. Squirrel.

I don't know which one of his family members met their fate on my street, but I can't tell you how glad I was to see Mr. Squirrel alive and well, still claiming my flower pots as his own. And...I think I'll just let him believe they're his. After all, I'm a good neighbor, too.