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My favorite Christmas custom is placing reminders of special people or events on my tree.
It's only a tiny artificial tree, but it's loaded with mementos.
Many were never intended to be ornaments: intricately whorled cross sections of pink seashells from Florida;
several small, hand-carved olivewood crosses from my trip to the Holy Land.
A few traditional ornaments, such as a deep blue, hand-blown ball
well over a century old, given to me by an "adopted aunt," bring to mind people I love.
Two antique stars are family heirlooms. But the ornament I save to put on last, most honored at the very top, came to me in a most unusual way.
It started late one autumn, a chilly evening in 1980, when I got home from work.
I happened to glance up at the crooked old apple tree next to the apartment garage, and a squirrel caught my eye.
His patchy coat looked unhealthy, and his tail downright bedraggled.
He looked hungry as well as sick.
I watched as he climbed the tree, but he couldn't climb very fast.
I felt sorry for him.
He looked as forlorn as an old bachelor with no one to love or look after him.
I went inside and
found an old sack of pecans. Then I placed one on the open cement porch, went back inside, and peeked between the red-and-white-checked door curtains.
"Come on down, Old Batch," I thought.
But the squirrel stayed in the tree.
I was too tired and hungry to keep vigil so I fixed supper and forgot about the nut. Next morning it was gone, and I put another in its place before leaving for work.
That evening it was gone too, so I put out a couple more. This became a daily ritual even though I seldom saw Old Batch.
About a week later, I was surprised to be welcomed home by the cautious
old squirrel, who approached to within three feet of me on the sidewalk, obviously ready to back off if I
made even one wrong move.
I spoke softly, and slowly climbed the steps: "I'm glad you can use the nuts," I said. "Let me get another one."
When I returned with it, I stooped to place it in the accustomed spot.
Then I went inside, gently closing the glass storm door.
Old Batch could see me, but he must have known I could not get near him. I waited excitedly, hoping to watch him eat this time.
Sure enough, the aging squirrel hopped up my steps.
But Old Batch ignored my nut. Instead, he inched his way to the brick planter next to the porch, hopped in, rummaged around and quickly pulled out a whitened
fragment of bone from his hiding place beneath the dead leaves.
Holding it in his paws, he seemed to be using it as a tool, as if he was sharpening his teeth.
His bright eyes watched me all the while.
Then he dropped the bone and picked up the nut.
He held it near his mouth but made no attempt to crack it with his teeth.
Dropping the nut, he hopped down my steps one by one, turned and cocked his head, and waited on the sidewalk.
His silent message
came though loud and clear: this old squirrel was too decrepit to crack hard old shells without breaking his teeth! He must still be hungry.
I found my nutcracker, cracked three nuts and slowly opened the door.
I placed the meal on the porch
and retreated.
Back in a flash, Old Batch ate two nuts, nibbling away as he held each one in his tiny paws.
He took the third nut with him.
From then on, I put out only cracked nuts, several at a time.
I continued to put cracked pecans out till mid-January, when the nuts went untouched.
I never saw Old Batch again. But he left behind vivid memories and something else.
The day after I began cracking the pecans, in exactly the spot where I had left them, I found a glittering,
many-faceted amber glass bead, about half an inch long.
I wondered where the mysterious gem had come from.
Maybe Old Batch had scavenged it from a trash sack, or picked it up after someone dropped it in the alley.
Had he held it in his tiny paws, turning his treasure around as the sun sparkled on it?
I like to believe that he left it just for me, as his only way of thanking me for
understanding his need.
I was so moved that I sent the bead to a Florida cousin, a jeweler who created a metal holder for my trinket.
I carefully sewed it in the center of a miniature white star made of starched hand-crocheted lace.
And at Christmas time the squirrel's sparkly gift is always the topmost ornament on my memory tree.
For me it is a beautiful reminder that I must never take for granted all the incomprehensible wonders of nature or forget that even the apparently voiceless can communicate very clearly if we pay attention when they feel moved to say "God bless you."
By Mary Bucher Fisher
ENCHANTED MERMAID'S GROTTO
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