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Somewhere along the journey for the purpose of my life, I took a detour with a squirrel.
I am an actor. I am a minister. The acting community keeps telling me that I need to stay in the arts. The church community keeps telling me that I need to stay in ministry. As of late, God has been mum on the subject.
It’s not that I haven’t asked. I ask daily, sometimes by the hours. What I’m really searching for as I round a half-century is some semblance of security in a career without giving up my soul.
It is my misfortune that I seek that security in either calling.
I’ve been grumpy for days, nay weeks, as this realization straps me fully into a strait jacket. I’m exhausted from seeking, panicked at the thought of having to settle on a life-sucking day job, and angry that once again I need to reinvent what I’ve been trying to create since I was four years old – my purpose.
I pulled into my driveway on an otherwise gorgeous May afternoon, still in my funk, mind on working one or more of the four jobs I currently have so we can cobble together grocery money. My teenaged son, living in his own pubescent funk, sat in the passenger seat – so the car was jammin’ with Weltschmerz-y vibes. All we needed was a Pearl Jam song.
That’s when I noticed a tiny squirrel running up the driveway in front of the car. She wasn’t in a flat-out scramble, like most squirrels. She just hopped and bobbed, clearly unfazed by the black tires on the blue SUV closing in on her hindquarters.
The squirrel took a quick left, under our gate, and into our yard to escape the impending squish & crackle should those tires catch her.
Bad move.
Our two-year old Jack Russell Terrier, Maya, was waiting.
Let me insert here that our most recently deceased dog, Marley, a corgi/chow mix, was the only dog I had ever known to actually catch a squirrel.
Until now.
Maya bounded after the squirrel, chasing her into the hot tub area. I figured, as I was getting out of the car laden down with the detritus of my four employers, the squirrel would be resourceful, as most squirrels are, and would find a way to climb the retaining wall, scurry over the fencing, and jump to a tree. I expected to see Maya left behind, doggy jaw hanging slack, watching the squirrel defy gravity, as they do, chittering at my sweet puppy from a nearby branch.
It was not to be. This was a singularly unresourceful squirrel.
I heard screams, first from my dog squealing with excitement, then from the squirrel in sheer terror. I opened the fence to see Maya with a wriggly blur of white and gray locked in her jaw. She tossed the poor thing at the stairs and little fluff ball immediately began to run – not away from, but toward the open mouth of my delighted dog. Clearly, this squirrel was on the lower end of Darwin’s list. Once again, my ferocious pooch snatched her up and threw her in the air. She landed in the grass. Just as Maya lunged for the kill, I screamed.
Unlike my recently deceased dog, Maya actually listened. She stopped in mid-sic, eyes turning to me with a look of confusion. She looked at the squirrel, lying on her back like a happy meal, then at me, wondering why-why-why I would stop her from doing what only came natural. And the poor little squirrel was breathing so fast, her little chest was jerking up and down in a pitter-patter, eyes glued to the large teeth inches from her thorax.
Miraculously, Maya stopped long enough to get my son to put her in the house. Now – what to do with the squirrel?
I poked at the squirrel with a garden tool to see if she was in shock, if she was bleeding, if she had lost a limb. She hissed at me. Who knew squirrels hissed? Little demons steal my tomatoes and then, when I legitimately try to help one of the buggers, she hisses at me.
Undeterred, I assessed that there was no internal bleeding, no shock, her reaction to my gentle prodding was swift and pissed-off, but still she wasn’t running away like she should. I rolled her over to see if she might scurry to the nearby tree. No such luck. She began moving toward the trunk, dragging her right leg behind her. The left leg moved, but the right one was mangled.
I ran inside, found an empty trashcan, some gloves, and a bit of courage that I keep on a shelf, then went back out to the squirrel. She was attempting the climb up the tree, but without that back leg she could only get so far before she toppled down again. It was downright pitiful, even for a demon tomato-thief. Knowing my gloves were far from thick enough, I held my breath and with one scoop I grabbed her tail and slid her into the empty wastebasket. She hissed again.
Let me just say that I love the Internet. After securing the squirrel (now named Mickey) on the back porch with a handful of pecans, I found an animal rescue site for squirrels in a matter of seconds. I called and within five minutes I was on the road to a wildlife rescue site in Chesterfield.
It was a half and hour away. It was dinnertime. My son had homework. My husband was working late. I had to work two of my four jobs. None of it mattered. Mickey had a broken leg and she couldn’t stay at my home with a marauding Jack Terrier and three cats waiting for a delicious dietary indiscretion.
Sometimes when we ask the universe for the purpose of our lives, we aren’t given answers. Sometimes we don’t even get lemons so we can make lemonade. Sometimes we get a sniveling, snarling, white-hot ball of canine terror and a gimpy squirrel.
For one blessed hour I didn’t obsess about my purpose. For one blessed hour, my only purpose on this planet was to see that a naïve, uncoordinated, ungrateful squirrel found a safe place to heal. Sometimes our purpose only comes an hour at a time.
Mickey found a good place at the rescue in Chesterfield. She’ll get the care she needs and be released to a new squirrel community that can hopefully teach her how to climb with her special leg. Maya got a good scritch behind the ears when I got home. After all, she was just doing what dogs are meant to do, and she did it really well. It’s good to know she’s in tune with her purpose when less-friendly animals roam the yard.
I take heart in knowing that communities usually try to take care of their own, we all end up doing what we are meant to do, and when things go south, as things tend to do on this planet, there are those in power who have the ability, and often times the calling, to change things for the better.
Hour by hour, I pray that I can live like I believe that. Because, I want to be a part of a world that believes in the potential for good that exists in each of us, one that supports a community harnessing that kind of potential, so I can do what I’m meant to do within such a world.
Still – no answers today. Only dogs and squirrels. I guess I’ll make some lemonade.
Ahh, but there are answers here, Terry, and you state it yourself in the next-to-last paragraph. You (like all of us) are meant to help others. We never know when the opportunities to do so will arise. But I do know that whether you are on stage, in the pulpit, or in your backyard, you successfully meet your purpose. These moments are not always accompanied by applause and fanfare, though, so we may miss them if we are not paying attention.
I so love your blogs and internal dialogues! Perhaps we miscue ourselves when we think that we should be settled into one purpose, perhaps that darn universe wants us to continue to multi-job and multi-task because we just have so many dang good talents. Yes, we want the universe to give us a break and let us have settled peace, but perhaps that is just not in the cards for our purpose. Keep writing, keep doing what you are doing, pet the dog, love the husband and child, but don’t forget to love yourself as well!
But the problem of needing to feed and shelter one’s family still exists, and it’s an in-your-face, every-single-moment anxiety. Jobs that help people do not pay well – and it’s getting worse with an increase in “part-time” or “no benefits” positions that still require 40 hours+ of each week to prove you *really* want the job. For example, I recently applied for a job with a very well-known and respected nonprofit. (Believe me, you would recognize the name.) I was offered an interview, but only if I agreed to an Executive Director position with NO BENEFITS and a ridiculously low salary. My response: “I’m disappointed about the low salary and the lack of benefits, but I will gladly accept an interview because I really, really need a job.” In the face of that kind of world, it’s hard to discern, or even care, what one’s purpose is. I applaud you, Terry, for continuing to try. I have given up any expectation of finding a purpose and care only about a job that will provide for my family and allow me flexibility within the 80-hour work weeks a nonprofit will expect me to work.