Black Squirrels

The Washington Post's John Kelly began a brief series called "Squirrel Week" with a look at the origin and expansion of the District's black squirrel population.

While this story isn't for everyone, the notion of exploring something we more or less take for granted is an interesting one. The effort can result in looking at the world with a modified, more informed perspective. It can provoke questions and lines of inquiry we would probably otherwise not have considered. It can help us appreciate the simple, commonplace aspects of our immediate environments. Over the centuries, philosophers and religious savants have followed these three paths. The fruits of their considerations and activities have enriched humankind in the big picture and on individual levels.

My mother's interest in philosophy was down-to-earth, but occasionally connected with the animals in her immediate environment. Gray squirrels were nearly constant visitors to the outside sitting area of her Pennsylvania garden apartment. They would stare at her, with a characteristic combination of cuteness and stupidity, and hope to get food. Sometimes Mom gave in and tossed the animals a little something. When she was in that mood, she connected her charity to that of St. Francis of Assisi, a plastic statue of whom she kept in the squirrels' reception area.

When my family lived in upstate New York, one of my brothers hunted the creatures. He brought one home, skinned it, and kept the fur in a clothes drawer without telling anyone in the family. One can imagine my mother's surprise when she opened the drawer one sunny summer afternoon.

After my small town upbringing, I lived in New York City for decades. Urban life does not generate trust of squirrels' habitats and mating. Squirrels were capable of anything, from simple sweetness to complete mayhem. More significantly, they were rodents. I wondered if they bred with their cousin rats, a true New York nightmare scenario.

My darker thoughts were dispelled by the immigrant and refugee students I used to teach. Some of them would spend their lunch time in Riverside Park; the squirrels' irrepressible spirit lifted them of their often heavy concerns. It gave the students a sense of renewed energy, all of which they would need in their efforts to build a sustainable life in an often alien, merciless environment. Like squirrels, they didn't need much to live some sort of life. They were committed, generally speaking, saving whatever money they could earn. My students did this during a time of American triumphalism, when leveraged spending, house flipping, and other speculative excesses ruled the day.

They never learned the phrase "squirreling away," but they lived its ethic. The chances are strong that the students' character has not significantly modified over the years. They remain solvent savers in the midst of nationwide foreclosures and foreboding. There's a fable in here, someplace, waiting to be told.