10 Nov Squirrel stories

I have always loved squirrels. I love the brown reddish color of their pelt. I love their thick furry tails. I love the way they gambol in the grass and jump from the one branch to the other. I love how they nibble on the acorn that they hold between their tiny claws.

Back home in the Netherlands, spotting a squirrel in the wild is highly unusual. I think I might have seen one when I was spending my summer break in the woods in the south of Holland a few years ago. But he was so fast and far away that I couldn’t make up whether he was a real squirrel or a mouse or bird or just a broken branch.

The rest of my encounters with squirrels occurred in the Amsterdam zoo or in Disney movies.

This all changed exactly three months ago, when I arrived here in the US. In this blog I will provide you guys a quick overview of my top 3 squirrel encounters in California.

#3 Socrates the Squirrel

On this picture, Socrates the Squirrel is participating in a staring contest with my friend Emma on the campus of Berkeley University. As we all know, it’s in a squirrel’s nature to adapt easily to his environment. This fact was clearly mirrored in Socrates’s behavior. Just like Berkeley students, he wanted to show that he was the most ambitious and would succeed in any competition. And he did. Emma got intimidated by the squirrel’s staring skills and took a step aside.

#2 Sabrina the Squirrel 

I’ve met Sabrina in Yosemite National Park, where she was posing on a big three trunk. She was hired as a model squirrel by Yosemite’s foresters, with the goal to provide the tourists an “authentic wild life experience” in the woods. Sabrina enjoyed posing in front of the visitor’s camera lenses so much, that she was considering to apply for the new national tv show Squirrel in the Spotlight.

#1 Slum the Squirrel 

Slum was a baby orphan squirrel, brought to our house by the guy who was dating my roommate. He told us he had a special suprise, and then grabbed this tiny fella out of his pocket. I almost cried of happyness. Slum climed in my arms, he ated a little nut out of my hands, he slept on my leap. I had never been so close with a squirrel and it felt great. Then Slum’s owner spoke to following words: “oh yeah, by the way, he has maggots.” We looked around and saw that my roommate’s bed was covered with those disgusting creatures. The skin on my arms started to itch.

The news that Slum had passed away reached us the following day. And it didn’t take long until the relationship of my roommate and squirrel man passed away as well.