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Det var en liten ekorre,
en mycket liten ekorre.
Han hade inte mycket förstånd
men han var varm och luden.
Nu är han kall, alldeles kall,
och alla hans små ben är stela.
Men han har fortfarande
den vackraste svansen i världen.
Tove Jansson, Trollvinter


I have just buried a squirrel. Not the cats' doing; it had drowned in the water butt and I found it when I went to get a canful of water to provide for the plants. At first I thought it was a pine cone. . . but that was its tail; it was floating there quite peacefully. Unless all the crime novels I've read lie, it can't have been in there too dreadfully long for it was quite stiff -- all its legs were indeed numb -- and rigor, I have learnt, leaves the body after a few hours. I buried it between a couple of roots beneath a birch. Good thing we don't have dogs; while the furheads were interested, they won't start to dig it out.

Unless I'm much mistaken it is about to start raining. (I hope it is; it's been dreadfully close and clammy today and I've had a roaring headache almost all day.) If it had started a little bit earlier I would never have felt the need to water the redcurrant bushes, and hence wouldn't have discovered the poor squirrel. I can't say that prompts me to any deep philosophical thoughts, but it is nevertheless true.

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