Thank you to Betty Buckley and Leonard Bernstein

Well, here we are STIll in the throes of winter–our fourth nor’easter just passed by leaving a foot of new snow. . .

I’m ready for the “lamb” part of March, having enjoyed the “lion” part.

And, in the meantime, there are strange noises in our bedroom wall during the night—a scrabbling sound.  When I nudge OtherHalf to tell him he assures me it’s “just mice”.  Oh, well then, fine, not to worry (!).  But—!  they sound like awfully big mice–rearranging the furniture or something.  Other says maybe they’ve brought in laborers.

After a week or so, though, the noise begins to rankle even Other Half and he calls in Critter Control.

The nice man climbs up into our attic and announces that we do indeed have mice AND squirrels.  (!).  So he plugs up a few holes or entries into the house at the roofline and sets some traps strategically around on the roof.  We are to check them and let the company know when we’ve caught something.

He explains that even though we have a lot of squirrels on the property–lots of trees–the squirrels in our house are a family—plain old regular squirrels won’t go in just willy-nilly–that squirrels are very territorial and it’s just a certain group going into our house.

So, I picture a little squirrel up on the crest of the roof standing up tall, beating his chest and singing:

“When you’re a jet
You’re always a jet . . .

When you’re a jet
Let them do what they will
You got brothers around
You’re a family man!”

And, in middle of the night, if I work on it, I can imagine that
I hear strains of “Maria” from atop the roof where that same little guy is straddling the peak of the roof–with a wary eye on keeping distance from those traps and singing in the moonlight:

“Maria! the most beautiful sound that I ever heard . . .

Maria, Maria, Maria, Maria,

I just met a squirrel named Maria . . .”  (sorry, couldn’t resist.)

Stay tuned.