Sunday, January 21, 2018

Morning Musings



Wednesday my area of the country, the US, was hit and I mean HIT with a snowstorm that was very reminiscent of my New Hampshire years.  I grew up in a wee town in NH where your arse could freeze to the sidewalk if you fell down at just the right time. 

A few days before the storm hit I could tell by the behaiour of the squirrels and birds we were in for something big.  My neighbors feed the squirrels and birds and they were coming in droves to feed and feed in big ways.  It wasn't the usual 3 or 4 at a time, there were often over a dozen around the feeders.  As I took my walks, I also noticed that they were shoring up their nests with leaves.

The forecasters called for 1-3 inches maximum.  The squirrels and birds were telling me we were going to get walloped.  We got walloped.  So far this year, squirrels 2, met office 0. 

The squirrels didn't come out that snowy day either.  They didn't come out for two entire days after it hit.  I noticed that too.  Their slow return was quite evident late on Friday afternoon. 

So today, as much of the lovely white stuff is melting and Southern Life is returning to something like normal, I'm watching those squirrels from the wee early hours of the morning.  As I get up before dawn most days, it's a lovely way to start the day.  Tea in hand, watch the sun rise over the treetops of the hill, and watch critters. 

As I watch them, I realize again, how they don't fight their intuition, their inner knowing, their inner "ding" as we humans far too often do.  Right now these little grey fluff tails are doing the following jobs: feeding (of course), carrying leaves from the ground as much as 50 feet into the limbs of the trees where their nests are located, and having a jolly good romp of play time with each other - a squirrel game of tag if you will! 

One particular nest I can see quite clearly from my chair and the male and female squirrels that own it are going up and down, up and down, dozens of times and each time up they are carrying leaves from a pile that was protected from the snow.  On the way up they are all business, yet on the way down they scamper with each other. 

They aren't worried about their calendar and getting their "to do list" done.  They aren't worrying about whether there will be enough leaves to do the job or the right colour leaves for that matter.  Up she goes, mouth full of leaves, stops on the first big branch, scratches, looks around, hope up and go again all the way to the top, another 30 feet in just seconds. 

You can learn a lot from squirrels if you watch and listen to them long enough.  If you think of them as souls/beings and not just little grey animals as society often teaches us to think. 

They know not to worry about things that make no sense really.  The 10,000 things Dr. Dyer used to tell us about in his books and lectures.  Lao Tsu's 10,000 things he described in the Tao.  The squirrels don't give a rat's arse about those 10,000 things. 

They don't worry about their butts being to big, small, round, flat etc.  They don't worry if "mom" will like our new wall paper/paint/sofa/chairs etc.  They don't worry if their hair is just right today.  They don't worry about how they look.  Down at the bottom of the hill there is a little half blind squirrel that always comes up to me to say hello.  He/She doesn't care about anything other than I'm kind and say hello to him/her that day. 

To us humans, they look like chaos we so, so try to avoid as they romp around chasing each other and going about their business.  In reality they are showing us how creator works at times.  Play, Work together, build together, work hard, play some more.  Oh you can learn a lot from squirrels any day and every day. 

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