Rocky the Squirrel

There's really nothing that interesting about this blog - I'm not even sure it merits retelling - but it is out of the ordinary and it's part of my childhood so here goes...

Havertown, Pa. was "squirrel central". The area had first been settled in the 1600s (so there were no natural predators) and there were loads of old oak and chestnut trees - and squirrels everywhere. One time I saw roughly 200 of them in a single tree (they were apparently having a convention or something)...

BTW - Our neighbor Bobby Croft caught a squirrel one day. I was about 15 feet away when it happened and I would not wish that pain on my worst enemy. The critter tore his hand open down to the bone and then ran off... Bobby was one of the toughest kids I knew (not even the Howleys would mess with him) and he was crying like a baby. And after his hand was stitched up he still had to undergo all those rabies shots... I completely gave up on trying to catch squirrels after that :-) But I digress...

One spring morning after a major storm I found a baby squirrel on the ground under one of our trees. It's eyes were still closed and it barely had any fur so it was probably 2 or 3 weeks old. I backed away for a few minutes to see if the mommy was around but she apparently abandoned it. So I ran and got my mom and she bundled it up and brought it inside.
Now I've mentioned that mom had a way with animals. All I can figure is she must have spent a good part of her childhood rescuing critters because she always seemed to know exactly what to do... She put it in a box with a hot water bottle and mixed up some kind of milk based concoction that she fed to it regularly using a dropper... And it survived... Not only that, but she got Bozo the retriever to leave it alone (had something to do with the way she introduced them).

We named the squirrel Rocky (because he flew out of a tree) and mom kept him in the box on the floor by her bed. Then one morning I was awakened by yelling coming from dad's room...

Sidebar: Our house in Havertown was "old-school Catholic". (There was even a small statue of the Virgin Mary set into the stonework on the front of the house.) The 2 main bedrooms had an open adjoining doorway between them. That was so the parents could have separate bedrooms (as all proper couples did in the olden days) and still enjoy "conjugal visits" without having to step into the hallway where they might been seen by inquisitive children... But I'd be surprised if my parents did anything conjugal at that point in their marriage :-) And back to the story:

Rocky's eyes had opened for the first time that morning and he'd ventured out of his box to explore the world. And after passing though the adjoining doorway he encountered his first living being - my father, who was 100 times his size and yelling at him.
Now for the longest time afterward dad couldn't talk about that morning without laughing. I guess the expression on Rocky's face was absolutely priceless - 'surprised' would be an understatement :-)

And Rocky soon became part of the family. He played with Bozo. You could hold him and pet him - he even came when you called. Unfortunately he wasn't housebroken, but was one very sweet (and confused) pet.
We did almost lose him once - when he was a couple of months old we left him in a box on the porch and a neighbor's dog went after him. We chased the dog away but Rocky ended up with a 'V-shaped' notch missing from the fur on his tail.

And then when he was 4 or 5 months old he disappeared completely. We were afraid that another dog had gotten him (he thought they were playmates) but then we started seeing him out in the yard (the notch in his tail was unmistakable).

I figure the other squirrels must have kidnapped him and sent him off to some kind of reeducation camp because he never trusted us again. One time I noticed him nearby and called to him, and he actually started in my direction. Then the other squirrels gave him a bunch of crap about it and he quickly retreated... Peer pressure sucks :-) :-)

I really missed having him as a pet, but I realized he was probably happier with his own kind...