Scandal at Cherry Tree Hollow

 

Old Man Winter truly enjoys the misery that he inflicts on humans, as he does not feel the cold himself! He forces the plant and animal worlds to grovel at his feet and to alter their behavior to survive his seasonal temper tantrum.  He is a mean and cantankerous old codger!

I believe it was the winter of 33’ and the cold weather had already been encroaching for some time. The squirrels in the forest behind my apartment had already used a considerable portion of their larder. While I was looking down and observing the forest from my apartment window, I noticed four squirrels all coming from different directions and converging at a large mushroom. Each squirrel had a satchel swung over his shoulder containing nuts presumably from their personal reserves. I wondered what the purpose of was their strange behavior. Were they meeting there to reinforce social bonds and support each other emotionally at this dreary alienating time of the year?

            One of the squirrels was a rather large dark grey rotund specimen. I named him Chunky. He carried a large satchel of nuts greater than that of the other three smaller scrawnier squirrels. The remaining three participants were all slim and included a red, a brown and a black squirrel. Chunky proceeded to pull out a deck of cards from his satchel and continued to shuffle and then deal out the cards to each participant, including himself.

I had read in Scientific American that squirrels were capable of remembering over 3000 hiding places for their nuts each winter. A deck of 52 cards would be child’s play for these furry little gamblers, although knowing the other players card denominations would certainly be of the greatest advantage. As I peered out of my window each day at high noon when this furry congregation assembled, Chunky’s satchel and waistline both continued to increase in girth. His bag contained more and more nuts each day while the other three players had less nuts in their bags and their owners appeared scrawnier. I observed that acorns seemed to be of little value as they were bandied about with seeming disregard, followed in ascending worth by Walnuts, Hazelnuts and Brazil nuts. The most valuable of all were Cashews.

            One day I cracked my window open slightly as it was warm outside, and I noticed that as the team assembled, a small unobtrusive bird also attended the proceedings, flying from tree to tree after each hand had been drawn and covertly covered while coveting the knowledge of each other participant’s cards.  The three malnourished participants were by this point playing for their lives and the fur hung from their emaciated carcasses. The bird would sing out a few notes after landing on a branch somewhere above and behind each of the scrawny players. It finally dawned on me that the bird was telling Chunky, in some previously agreed upon code, each scrawny player's hand. None of the Marks realized that they were being scammed! It was fortunate that Johnny Appleseed, John Muir and Teddy Roosevelt had not lived to see this disgrace after all their hard work to preserve wildlife!

            When the game ended as always, Chunky was the big winner. The other dejected players staggered away with empty satchels disillusioned by their bad luck, and I followed Chunky with my binoculars as he struggled along dragging his booty. The criminal conspiracy reconvened at Cherry Tree Hollow where the fat greedy squirrel and the covert bird met to divvy up the profits! What a disgrace! What an outrage! I was visibly enraged at this level of rodent corruption comparable in its entropic fall from grace to the sleaziest backstreet underground casino in Shanghai!

            The next day as the furry team of gamblers assembled along with the feathered spy, I quietly opened my window and waited until Chunky dealt the cards and each emaciated player picked them up.

“Look, look,” I yelled and pointed with my outstretched arm to the bird.

“That bird is reading your cards and telling your rotund friend there what they are!”, I exclaimed.

“Oh, Nuts!” whispered Chunky to himself.

The squirrels were dazed and confused at first in their malnourished state but quickly figured out that they had been duped and all three angrily pounced on Chunky biting and clawing at him as he tried to escape. Chunky finally fought them off and staggered away leaving his satchel of booty behind. When the three smaller squirrels finally calmed down and collected themselves, they divided the bag of nuts into three equal portions and after saying their goodbyes headed home for a better meal than they had eaten in some time. All three agreed that gambling was a vice that they wagered would be better to avoid in the future.

I would need to keep my window shut and hunker down for some time as Chunky, that Moriarity of the rodent world, now had a vendetta and a potential hit out on me by one or more of his rabid subordinates!

Jim March 23’