Last year there was a white squirrel
That lived in the tall sycamore trees on the little bank across the stream
He was a big belligerent fellow
I saw him for months, chasing and wrestling with his rivals on the ground and spiraling up and down the trees
I would watch him through my binoculars
And several times got a very good close up look
He was leucystic, not albino
White on top, brown legs and tail
Which is apparently more common
Some have red or blue eyes but I couldn’t see a squirrel eye at 250 yards, even with magnification
I spent a long time reading about white squirrels on the internet, as I would watch him
They’re not particularly rare, although I’d never seen one before
Some places have lots of white squirrels due to the genetics
I even reported him to the official white squirrel website (not joking)
I had some trepidation outing him, although I doubted anyone would sneak into the forested creekside back corner of my sister-in-law’s property, just to harass a squirrel
I’ve not seen him this year
And had to research how long a squirrel’s lifespan is in the wild
Many die early on, but if they live past 2 years, can live up to 8 years or so
I truly understood how the rare and precious sometimes don’t make it as long, as I marveled last year at how much his whiteness stood out against the drab yellow and brown of autumn
Wondering how a hawk or other sharp-eyed predator didn’t find him, when I could see him with my less acute human eyes, from all the way up the hill
So I suspect he didn’t make it
I have a vision in my head of him angrily barking at whatever got him, belligerent to the end
Because I like the thought of that end better, than illness, or cold, or falling
I saw a squirrel fall once
You’d think, with their athletic acrobatics, that it doesn’t happen
But this one misjudged the distance between the branches spanning the stone-fenced road
And I actually saw the look of surprise, the flailing feet before he crashed to the pavement, and unable to slow, I ran over him
It was almost like watching Wile E. Coyote run off a cliff – and I laughed and cussed at the same time
This morning I swear I saw a brief flash of white, twice, on the ground under the tall sycamore trees on the little bank across the stream
So maybe, just maybe, he survived the hard winter
Able to stand out against the autumn drabness for another season
Or maybe it was just wishful thinking
Only existing as a notation on a website about white squirrels
