On a spooky, rainy and balmy Halloween Eve, I was awoken by a rustling. The wind, I wonder to myself. Then a poking and a prodding at my windowsill. Not the wind, I admit. I get up and look at the clock: 4:44 AM. I walk over to the window, and wait. More rustling. More poking, more prodding. I pull the curtains apart. I lean forward, my belly pushing up against the window unit air condition that had yet to be removed. I stare outside, beyond the window glass, over the meaningless air conditioner, and I see what I feared I would see. While the wind was whipping and whistling through the courtyard here in sleepy Evanston, it was not the cause of the peculiar non-wind-driven rustling at the outer edge of my window. It was, in fact, it.
This was not my first encounter with it. That thing, that beast. Indeed, my first encounter with it was over a year ago. Under similar circumstances I was awakened to the same kind of raucous at my window. Always at night, and always while I was out cold in that dreamy nothingness we call sleep. Yes, it would appear during this inconvenient of moments in an effort, one might posit, to add frustration to any other reaction it hoped to illicit during its nocturnal suburban brand of emotional terrorism. And since then, leading up to this encounter on Halloween Eve 2009, I had had several encounters with the creature. Its modus operandi always having been the same, foul beast.
I should be glad that I have come out of the ordeal unharmed, and virtually unaffected by these nightly appearances by it. Perhaps others might not have been so lucky. Somewhere in this country there is another person, perhaps many, who have had the same kind of experience. These fellow experiencers understand what it is like to be awakened by these cacophonous intrusions and only pray that the glass barrier of a window (and in my case the additional obstacle of an air conditioner) is enough to keep back such horrific monsters. I thank the heavens I am unscathed by this, both physically, spiritually, psychologically, libidinously, etc.
And why should I not be? It was, after all, just a squirrel.
This pesky little monster had been tormenting me for two summers and two autumns. Initially, banging on the window would scare it away but with the passing of time it not only grew more and more courageous but I also perceived it to increase physically in size. Perhaps its increased girth gave it the confidence to stare me down this last time, impervious to my repeated, retaliatory banging of the glass, shaking of the window frame, cursing, etc.
No, this story does not end with some gory, bloody rodenticide. No, there is not a tiny squirrel head mounted above my headboard. I did remove the air conditioner, finally, from my window, and that seems to have eliminated the visitations. It appears that something about my window unit attracted it, compelled it to try and make out of it a snug wintry cove. But unfortunately for it, the sanctuary outside of unit 1J is no more. It will need to find some other little nook to juggle its nuts.
But I do know one thing. It will be back. My only recourse (since the association won't ever buy into modern HVAC) is to pick up and leave to less arboreal vicinities; to leave Evanston, calm little borough that it is, and head back to a place like Chicago, where the animals are fearful of the people (save for rats and pit bulls).
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Doubtless, this tale of viciousness and villainy will not go down in most annals of man vs. beast, since it does not involve a beast per se; and the role of man in this story is also, perhaps, questionable. I mean, who battles with a squirrel, really? Having lived the tale, and being a self-aware man, I am only the right person to pass such judgement upon the writer, that is, myself.
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