The Tale of Simon
Once upon a time...every story starts that way… Sam Red
Squirrel from Bellevue, PA and Simon Gray Squirrel from Clifton, NJ attended
their family reunion at The Squirrel Family Reunion is Pinson, AL.
As was their custom after a feast of hazelnuts, cashews, filberts and
almonds, stories were being shared.
Simon told Sam about the nice Christian lady called Mrs. Clyde whose yard he lived in. The yard had maple and oak trees, and a small hillside of wildflowers. Two yards away was his favorite tree, the black walnut, whose nuts were downright tasty. She had four birdhouses hanging from her garage roof, which always seemed to be filled with nesting baby starlings. Mrs. Clyde would throw scraps of bread out for the birds. I used my best football maneuvers to get that delicious honey wheat bread before those noisy mother starlings would swoop down. I appreciated all that Mrs. Clyde did for me. One morning when she was away, I left her my best black walnut. It was a beautiful shade of green, symmetrically perfect. With the movements of a circus acrobat, I placed it on her patio door handle. When she came home, I thought she would be pleased. She apparently wasn’t. Maybe, she didn’t like their taste. She threw it back onto the grass. Didn’t she realize that my bringing the walnut to her was to let her know how much I liked her? I grabbed the walnut and put it in my special hiding place. I don’t use post-it notes like my cousin, Martin, the famous 3M squirrel on television! Perhaps, I can bring Mrs. Clyde something else.
“Simon, your stories are too long, but I like them! Tell me more!”
“My other story happened the very next day,” reported Simon. Mrs. Clyde had gotten a present of magnificently beautiful Delicious apples and oranges. She had no room in her refrigerator. It was October; the air was cool and crisp, and Mrs. Clyde felt she could keep her box of goodies in a covered box on a lawn chair on the patio. I could smell those apples all the way up in the oak tree! I couldn’t resist. I just had to steal one of those large juicy apples. Mrs. Clyde had company. While she was making breakfast, I worked real hard to get the lid off of the box, but I couldn’t. Suddenly, the box lid fell off and out rolled the apples. I chose the biggest, shiniest and most succulent of the apples. It was half my size! As I was trying to make my getaway, that nice genteel Southern Lady came onto the patio and screamed “You drop that apple right now! It’s mine!” Couldn’t she see that I was holding it between my paws and anchoring it with my very large two front teeth? It wasn’t easy to let it go. I never heard her so angry, so selfish! What was I to do? I dropped the apple and ran. Suddenly Miss Cooky came onto the patio, “Sam, I think she is from Bellevue too!” I heard her say gently to Mrs. Clyde, “Are you going to eat it now that Simon had nibbled on it?” She thought about it for a few seconds and threw that beautiful piece of fruit back to me. These were gentle ladies and I knew they wouldn’t harm me. I scampered to get the apple and brought it to my hiding place in the big oak tree where I ate it. I then took a long afternoon’s nap and dreamed about those other apples in the box.
Now, Sam was a philosophical fellow, and Simon was known for his exaggerated tales. “Well, Simon?” said Sam, “what is the moral of that last story?” Simon smiled, exposing his two big shiny front teeth again, and said, “An apple in the paws is worth two in the box!”
And they lived happily ever after…. That’s how stories are supposed to end, you know…..
