My neighbors eat raw mice
Feb 17, 2023 5:22 pm
Animals=People=Animals
There's a local hunter who's been hanging around my backyard recently. Their camoflague doesn't really work against the shingle roof of my chicken house, but it's not like they'll listen to me. I don't have chickens yet, but it could be that the hunter knows what a chicken house looks like. Pretty much everyone likes to eat chickens.
A local mom group has picnics on the grass of the property next door, which has a much nicer lawn than mine. The moms and their kids were there nearly every evening last summer and fall. I don't see the dads much. To be honest, I prefer when they stay on that side of the fence. Last year they helped themselves to my roses and the entire contents of my birdfeeder. (Now I mix chili pepper flakes with the seeds because they avoid spicy food.) They walk around the neighborhood like they own the place (which I guess they kinda do). I do wish they'd be more careful crossing the road. Every year some of the moms get hit by cars and die.
My favorite neighbors are this black family I've been trying to befriend. On the west coast they're friendlier, but around these parts my people have been treating their people badly for centuries, so they instinctively don't trust anyone who looks like me. I give them peanuts and the catfood my roommates don't like. Once I gave them a leftover dead mouse Zinko caught and they loved it. After a year of coaxing, they'll now consistently come and eat, but if they see me in the window, they'll scatter. They're incentivized to be brave, because if they wait too long to eat the peanuts, their cousin jay will swoop down and get them all.
A week or two ago this family started yelling like someone was eating their snacks, and I caught sight of this gorgeous redhead. Probably a future chicken-thief, but sure is easy on the eyes, right?
It's easier to see local animals as neighbors if you think of yourself as one of them. That's pretty evident in Animal Magic, which is the most autobiographical of all my novels. When Scar finds out that animals in her neighborhood are getting magic powers, it doesn't occur to her that as a human being she'll be exempt. She knows she is one of the animals, even if she talks and wears clothes and goes to school.
All the other animals in her neighborhood have started getting magic powers. Eleven-year-old Scar wants to get in line.
Did you read this book? I'd love your reviews and recommendations!
This week's question: Have you ever been friends with an animal that wasn't a pet?
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