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Selena Gomez :: #ThankYouJesus

herocious

Before I publish the new post from Al Billings, I want to briefly respond to Allen Butler’s most recent post about an encounter with a squirrel.

It comes to me in the wake of a couple related personal events.

One. About a month ago, on the way to the Young Adult Book Fair in Austin at St. Edward’s University, walking with bridget and miss-clare, we pause for bridget to tie the laces of her shoes.

A squirrel pauses too, about 25 feet away. The squirrel stands in the tall grass, green blades come up to its arms, and eats a nut.

I see a seed on the ground that looks harmless enough, pick it up, and fling it directly at the squirrel. Being a Little League pitcher, the seed whizzes over the top of the squirrel at a good velocity.

“Michael! Did you just throw a rock at that squirrel? You could’ve killed it.”

“It was a seed,” I say. “I wanted to see if it would move. And it didn’t.”

I process the findings of my curiosity then bridget slaps my shoulder.

“Michael!”

Not only is she ashamed of me throwing an object at the squirrel, rock or seed, she also doesn’t believe such an action would occur to me. What does it make me?

miss-clare laughs. She think it’s funny that I threw a seed at the squirrel, and she knows it was just a seed, in other words, she knows that if I popped the squirrel on the head, the squirrel would have been okay. It was child’s play.

Meanwhile, the squirrel is still standing there, chewing on the same nut, looking at us.

Two. Three days ago, just before I read Squirrel, Resurrected on #FlashFictionFriday, bridget, Lenny, and I walk to St. Edward’s University and come across a dead squirrel. I keep Lenny close.

“That’s the second dead squirrel I’ve seen this week,” I say, not really seeing it clearly since I left my prescription eyeglasses at home.

“That squirrel was killed,” bridget says.

“What do you mean?”

“An animal didn’t do that. Someone dissected it.”

“Really?” I say, squinting back at the dead squirrel, but having to use my imagination rather than vision to see what it looks like.

We avoid the squirrel on the walk home, detouring through a field where Lenny rolls around in decaying organic matter.

At home I turn on the laptop and bridget and I both read Squirrel, Resurrected.

“Wow,” I say, “squirrels.” I say, “Squirrels.”

“Yeah,” bridget says, “and it’s weird how it ends with “Thank you, Jesus.”

“Why?” I say.

“A few days ago, Selena Gomez mouthed ‘Thank you, Jesus’ on tv and used it as a hashtag. I wonder if Allen knows about that.”

December 1, 2014 12:18 pm

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