Chester? Oops!

Last fall, I wrote a few times about my new squirrel friend who was hanging out in the yard with me almost every day.  Almost immediately after I named him Chester, he stopped coming around and I was bummed.  When I shared my disappointment with a good friend of mine, he suggested that maybe Chester was a girl and that she was offended I had given her a boys name.  We had a good laugh about it but sure enough, this spring, Chester started coming around again, and it was very clear that not only was Chester a girl, but she was also a new mom.  I changed her name to Chelsea and she seems much happier with that.  :-)

We have developed quite a friendship and I'll admit, I am crazy about her.  I never thought I'd fall in love with a squirrel but she has really wormed her way into my heart.  She plays the equivalent of "hide and seek" with me, although she's the only one who does the hiding. When I am sitting in the backyard, she often sneaks down onto the patio and hides behind one of the flower pots near me.  She'll pop her head up and look at me, and when I say, "I can see you!" she'll duck down behind the pot again.  She'll do it three or four times and once she's sure she's got me laughing, she'll scurry off.

Last week, she extended the game further.  A noise caught my attention and when I looked up at the roof of the first story, I saw her sitting in the rain gutter.  I said, "Hi Chelsea" and she ducked down into the rain gutter so that I couldn't see her.  I could hear her moving, so I said, "I can hear you!" and just then she popped up out of the gutter again, about a foot down from where she had been.  She stared at me for a minute (and I swear, she was smiling), then she ducked down again and made her way a little father along the rain gutter.  I said, "I can hear you!" and once again she popped up and looked at me.  She did this across the entire rain gutter and then disappeared over the roof.

There was another day this summer when she really blew me away.  I was walking into the house when I saw her moving along the fence really slowly.  She looked like she was having trouble walking so I stopped and asked her if she was OK. She stopped and just stared at me so I said, "Do you need some Reiki?"  She looked me straight in the eye and then laid down on the fence, with her arms and legs hanging down on either side.  I was so stunned I just stood there with my jaw hanging opened for a minute but then my brain clicked back into gear and I realized she had just answered me.  I sent her Reiki from where I stood and after about fifteen minutes, she got up and walked away.  The next day when she came by for a visit, she had a noticeable "pep in her step" and it warmed my heart.

I'm hoping that any day I'll have a new german shepherd and at this point, my only concern is whether he'll get along with Chelsea.  :-)