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Yesterday, I was walking along the path north from Winters. A few feet into the field to my right was a line of trees. On the ground below them I saw three squirrels. Normally, this would be strange for a January afternoon, but we have no snow here any more (as I write this it is warm enough to walk around outside without a coat). I've been noticing a lot of squirrels around campus lately, and they've been acting in a manner that suggests ownership of this space. We're all so busy fighting Lorna Marsden for this same area, calling it our 'Student Space,' that we've forgotten about the squirrels. They don't have to live by anyone's rules, least of all President Marsden's. These three were acting exceptionally strange. Considering that York is home to the weirdest, most aggressive squirrels out of any place I've been, these particular ones were the most fucked-up squirrels I've ever seen in my life.
One of them was gnawing all the bark off the broken branch. I stopped to watch, as this creature tore into its task, much as hyenas do to a carcass. After a few seconds it noticed me, and turned towards me a gaze that was less of a situational evaluation than an outright threat. 'That's right. I'm chewing through a branch. Get lost, because your flesh is a lot softer.'
After several harrowing seconds I remembered the size difference involved, and moved my attention to the next squirrel. This one was intent on getting into an overhanging tree. Instead of climbing up the trunk, which was about eight feet away, it seemed insistent on jumping a foot or two into the air to claw at a small, unsteady, swaying branch. The first time, it ended up hanging by its forepaws, swinging back and forth from the end of a branch that could not remain stable while supporting any animal larger than a mouse. Eventually, the squirrel had to let go. It tried and failed about four more times, and never did end up trying the trunk, probably because--
At that moment, a male voice cut through the quiet outdoor ambience, coming from somewhere up in McLaughlin residence, directly behind me.
'Hey Squirrel Boy! Get a room!'
What the eff.
I'm in that curious non-York again. North of Winters, the pathway leads to that mysterious (to me) other building and goes either around it or through that courtyard area that stretches under a part of it, to where the two rejoin again. I want to visit all our half-remembered nooks and great spots over there again.
Then I'm on a bus with some friends. We're heading south on the huge road that passes the campus -- it's not Keele, though -- and it's really interesting just to look out the windows. There were some really nice shops and restaurants, a very nice, alive -- ALIVE! -- part of town, and not the edge of nowhere at all.
Then various scenes; I don't know if they're in this other York or not, but I find myself in a world that I've been a part of for a long time already. Matty H. is talking to Raymi on the internet, and she's actually talking with him, too. It's far more mundane than her blog, though -- is that good or bad?
Walking along an east-west thoroughfare, it's dusk-turning-to-night. Now we're all gathered by some strange outdoor machinery apparatus, all high-tech but with an air of Rube Goldberg whimsy. Coach is talking about this guy, Mexican (I think), "Bambino" -- I only know him by reputation -- not sure if he's dead or just gone away, but Coach sure misses him. Apparently, he was one-of-a-kind.
I suppose we all are, just not the kind that matter to the Coaches of the world.
Back to yesterday, I remember being back at that amazing Ope, this time overrun by only those aspects of it that I don't remember fondly. This place that I explain to Winters folk as my Winters-before-Winters is now revisited in its most bureaucratic form. A large meeting of Staff and Administration and Desk People, in a building like the new Accolades. I wonder why I've come back this summer. Kiera and Tyler and Roy and Sean and Lisa and Rob and everyone, every single amazing person I'd worked with weren't there. Why was I?
The senior people present ended up speaking in no uncertain terms about god, or God as they envision it. Some younger staff member in the audience rose up in opposition, kind of showing off, though, and then the whole thing just went to hell.
I ended up, completely frustrated at another ruined thing, at home. But then Ben from Winters, and Warren from Ope, who have never met, are visiting for a while and sleeping over at my house, and amazingly enough, getting along great with my parents.
