Attack of the Woodland Creatures

I'm staring up into the fir tree, thinking if I should slowly back away or stand my ground. After all, I am on my property. In my back yard for Pete's sake! I should be able to pull weeds and plant grass anytime I want. But instead I've taken the earbuds of my iPod out so that I can listen better--listen to the threat of an undoubtedly rabies infected squirrel with a wiry tail.

I don't know what I was thinking before. I've seen many squirrels performing the high wire across the top of my fence. I've seen them in the trees. I've thought they were cute and friendly and on my side. Boy, was I wrong. I can see that now. This squirrel is pissed at me. He hates me. He is clearly telling me to leave.

I don't really know how it started. I was bent over, trying to get some stubborn dandelion out of the lawn when I heard scratching and scurrying across the fence. I look up and see a squirrel dive from the fence to a tree branch. He goes closer to the base of the tree and then starts having convulsions. His body looks like he's doing hip hop, and his long skinny tail is twitching crazily. At first I think he's just been startled, as I have, but then he starts to click at me.

I never knew that squirrels could talk. But they can. They can scream and they can growl. It sounds mostly like a click you would make with your own vocal chords, only deadlier. Not quite a hiss, but it is quite threatening. And they can be loud. It's really probably one of the more terrifying moments I've encountered with a woodland creature, aside from the time I saw a buck in the forest behind my house and ran for my life because I thought the deer was about to charge me.

So there I am, staring up at this squirrel who is having convulsions and clicking at me in a very threatening tone. He's not running away. He moves around on the branches, and I half wonder if his plan is to scurry to the end of one of the branches, leap off, land on my head, and give me a rabies bite to my face. Seriously. This seems likes something he might do.

As I gaze up into the tree, I start to speak rationally. "Look," I begin. "This is my property. I will stay on my side of the fence. It's my home. I realize that you are in your home as well, but can't you just stay on your side of the fence? I promise not to bother you." I actually say all of this. No kidding.

The wiry squirrel is having none of it. He starts to puff his chest out, like he's on steroids. His incessant clicking and squealing and body convulsions has notified some back up. I see through the branches that another squirrel is hopping along, coming to aid him in his distress. It takes about two minutes, and then I have two squirrels threatening me. The back up squirrel does the same thing. He twitches his tail and clicks and twists. This one is fatter and its tail isn't so long and wiry. Like maybe he doesn't have rabies.

What I start to think is oh, shit I've got to get out. Because this isn't safe. They could seriously jump onto my head via the branch highway. I take off my gardening gloves and start to back towards the house. I don't actually go inside the house. What I do is go start working on the other side of the yard, away from the tree and it's furious inhabitants. After a few minutes, I wander back over to the tree.

The first psychotic squirrel is gone. Number two is still there, but he is silent. I watch him for a bit, until he decides to scurry back. I want to feel safe. I really do. I want to bend over and continue my work, but I am apprehensive. What if they went back to get the whole squirrel brigade together and at this very moment they are climbing to the tops of the trees, planning a surprise attack on me? You've never seen a squirrel so fierce.

I wanted those cute, little squirrels who lived in the tree on the other side of the fence to be my friends, I really did. But now I see it like it really is: we are enemies.