Dan Fishback: Aggressive American squirrels

I know we're supposed to get on with our lives. And I see that we are getting on with our lives. The other day, someone asked me to stop writing about "it." Apparently, people want to open a newspaper and read something happy -- something about clowns or squirrels. They've had enough war. It's monotonous and boring.

And anthrax? It's too scary to think about, so let's just not think about it -- right?

No! Wrong! This is life! This is reality! This is important, and it's happening now, so I'm writing about it, goddammit! I'm going to write my opinion! I'm going to write... I'm going to... Um...

I don't really have an opinion. Not in the This-is-the-issue-and-this-is-how-I-feel-about-it sense of the word. I'm just a college student -- an English major at that. What do I know about foreign policy? I've looked around for information, but I don't really know who to believe.

The government has to censor itself for national security. So do the newspapers. It's tempting to listen to all the special interest groups, but they're not entirely accurate either.

I can't absolutely trust anything I read. And even if I could, I'd have no context. To really understand, I'd have to hide somewhere in Van Pelt and research the history of American foreign policy since World War II. I'd have to read Afghan ethnographies. I'd have to read the Quran.

I'd frankly love to do all these things, but short of dropping out of school, I can't manage it. And while I've actually considered taking some time off, I get the nagging suspicion it would breach our whole "back to normal" policy.

And so I don't really know much. Sure, I have one or two opinions about what I think is going on in the world, but those opinions are completely useless. Who cares what I think? I barely know the score, and I've actually tried to find out.

And yet here I have this weekly 750 words.

My column-mates have been making interesting use of their space in recent weeks. They've told you about sandwiches, Bucks County and SEPTA. They've even attacked each other's journalistic integrity. It's been great fun.

Perhaps, then, it's not evil or irresponsible at all to talk or write about other things. It would be more irresponsible to spout off about something I know so little about. It would be irresponsible to take a vocal, explicit position on this war without really understanding it first. There's less journalistic integrity there than in a simple factual error.

So maybe I should give you what you want.

Lucky for you, I've become obsessed with squirrels. Lingering outside of College Hall, I recently discovered that if you stare at them long enough, they stare right back at you. They stand up on their hind legs and stretch themselves out, pointing at their chests with clenched paws, as if to say, "You starin' at me, punk?"

I haven't yet had a staring contest that didn't end with another human scaring away my opponent, so I choose to believe that if we went undisturbed, we could stare at each other until we're old and gray, or in his case, grayer.

Apparently, our gray squirrels are as aggressive as they seem. After the British colonized America, they brought some of the little buggers back with them. Soon enough, the British population of red squirrels was virtually wiped out by wild, furry little Yanks.

But their aggression doesn't stop there. The other day I was watching a chipper little fellow collecting nuts and burying them in the ground for safe keeping. As soon as he scampered off, another, fatter squirrel uprooted the precious nuts and ate them right there! He didn't even bury them, like his wiser victim. A voracious consumer, this squirrel demanded instant gratification for his plunder.

We derived the word "squirrel" from the ancient Greek skiouros. "Skia" means shade, and "oura" means tail -- together, a squirrel is "he who sits in the shadow of his own tail." In other words, he who is overshadowed by his own ass.

To sum up then, American squirrels are aggressive, thieving creatures, dwarfed by enormous rear ends, who wreak havoc overseas. It's also worth repeating that I have no explicit opinion about American foreign policy... I think. That would be irresponsible.

Dan Fishback is a junior English majorfrom Olney, Md.

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