What Every Squirrel Wants

When squirrels are not chasing the opposite sex, they seem to have only one other thing on their minds―eating.  Every bit of their energy and resourcefulness seems to be devoted to this pursuit, and they let nothing stand in their way.

I once lived in an apartment on the shore of Lake Michigan.  The apartment had an eastern exposure that faced the lake, wooden floors, and a series of side-by-side cased windows in the living room that looked collectively like a big picture window.  Just outside, between my apartment and the lake, was a park with many large, old oak trees, which were home to a well-established squirrel population.

Whenever I was bored, I enjoyed sitting at the sill of the windows, watching the squirrels play in the park.  One day, while sitting there, a squirrel surprised me by appearing outside suddenly on the sill of the window I was looking through.  When it saw me, it stopped and just looked as if it were waiting for something.  When I moved slightly, it became startled and jumped down from the sill and ran back to the park.  Then I got an idea.

I had an old bag of peanuts in one of my kitchen cabinets, so I went and got it.  I came back to the window, opened it, and then slid the screen up.  I placed a few peanuts on the outside sill, and waited.

The squirrel must have been watching me from some lofty tree branch nearby, because within a couple of minutes, it had returned and was sneaking cautiously along the sill outside until it reached the spot where I had placed the peanuts.  Apparently, it accepted them in the spirit they were offered, because it sat there calmly, cracking open the shells, getting at the nuts inside, and it didn't seem nervous about me watching.  When it finished eating, it looked at me as if to say, "Is that all?"

When I did nothing, it jumped down and ran off to the park again.

Everyday, I began to leave a little pile of peanuts for my newfound friend in the evening when I came home from work. Everyday, it came to visit and gobble them down.  Eventually, I could sit by the window and hold a peanut outside, and the squirrel would creep toward me and take it with its tiny, little hands.  At first, it would take the peanut and run off somewhere to eat it.  But after a while, I gained its trust.  It took my hand-held offerings, ate them right there in front of me, and waited for more.

One day I forgot to leave a pile of peanuts for the squirrel because I had arrived home late, and didn't have time to wait at the window.  I had however, opened the window and rushed to the kitchen to make dinner.  I was standing at the stove cooking, when I heard a faint tip-tap tip-tap tip-tap tip-tap tip-tap on the wood floor behind me.  I turned around and looked down.  The squirrel was squatting and staring at me.  It had a look on its face that seemed to ask, "Where are the peanuts?"  As soon as I moved to open the cabinet where they were kept, it scampered through the apartment and disappeared through the open window, out to the park.  I had made the mistake again of not leaving peanuts for it.  Little did I know making that mistake again would cause chaos.

One evening my girlfriend came to visit and she decided to stay for the night.  I hadn't told her about my recent squirrel feeding habit, not thinking about it.  We had an enjoyable evening together and then went to bed.

In the morning I awoke to a deafening, ear piercing scream that came from my girlfriend.  My eyes opened immediately to see her back pressed against the wall, the sheet pulled up around her neck, and her eyes popping out of her head.  She was pointing behind me toward the entrance to the bedroom, which I was facing away from.  Her screams continued as I expected to see a menacing hooded intruder standing behind me with a gun.

Instead, when I spun around, I saw my buddy the squirrel squatting about three feet away from me, with the same terrified look on its face as my girlfriend had on hers.  Damn!  I had forgotten to leave peanuts for it again!  I quickly leaped from bed and the squirrel took off running into the living room.

It occurred to me that she was expecting me to pursue and annihilate this vermin because to her, it was just a rat with a big fluffy tail that had scared her and definitely should not be in the apartment, much less the bedroom.  The poor little squirrel was just looking for a meal.

As I ran around the living room chasing the squirrel, I realized that when I had gone to bed the previous evening, I forgot to close the window I sat at usually to feed the squirrel, but had closed the outer screen.  The squirrel must have come early in the morning for a snack, regardless of its regularly scheduled feeding time, and seeing that the window was open, chewed through the screen to come inside looking for a handout.  Not seeing one readily available, it went looking for me until it found me in the bedroom.  Unfortunately, it also found my girlfriend who didn't share my sense of humor about the situation.

As I chased it around the living room, it must have forgotten, in all the excitement, how it got into the apartment.  It was now zipping everywhere searching for a way out.  Then it ran into the kitchen.  I followed it there, grabbed the broom, and jumped onto the counter as the squirrel ran past me back into the living room.  I ran over to the window and opened it and the screen higher so the squirrel could see how to escape.  My girlfriend was still screaming, the squirrel was still running around the living room, and I was chasing it with the broom.

Eventually, it ran near the window and saw its opportunity to get out.  When it zoomed through, I ran over to the window, oblivious to the fact that at least ten of my neighbors had been standing about twenty feet away outside in the park, walking their dogs, watching the whole squirrel chasing drama.  I stood there naked with bed-head, holding the broom looking like a madman.  One of the neighbors quietly and politely asked, "Squirrel problem?"  I stood erect proudly, brushed my hair back, shouldered the broom like a soldier's weapon, and said, "No, no problem."  The other neighbors stood there staring speechless with their jaws dropped in astonishment.

I shut the window, grabbed the curtains and pulled them shut.  It took a while to calm my girlfriend while I explained to her how I had started feeding the squirrel recently and that it had grown accustomed to me doing so.  I had to assure her that my apartment wasn't normally subject to invasion by squirrels, or any other wild critters, before she would ever agree to come visit me there again.

As time went on, she resumed her visits, but before she would ever step foot in the apartment, I had to show her that the window was closed and there were no other visitors that weren't human.

The relationship with her didn't last, but the friendship I had established with the squirrel did.

I couldn't help but wonder though, when I moved out of that apartment eventually, if the new tenants ever slept with the living room window open.