It’s one of my favorite logs to sit on. A dead tree, it’s bark shed long before it fell.
Today I saw that it’s also the dining room table of another creature, smaller than myself. At first, I thought it was scared off, probably by a larger animal, maybe even myself.
But then I saw how the meat of the hickory nutshell was already brown as if it had been lying around for a while.
If whoever was eating it had been scared off, why didn’t they come back when whoever scared it off moved on. That made me think that whoever was eating it, a chipmunk, or squirrel just got tired of trying to get down to the nut.
The whole scene reminded me of stories I’ve read where a home is suddenly abandoned for one reason or another, maybe an erupting volcano or a murder. The teacup is still on the table, waiting for someone to stir honey into it and drink it.
I didn’t sit on the log today and left the hickory nut as I found it. Although Zinnia was interested in it, I told her to “leave it” and she did.
I doubt it will be there the next time I walk in the woods. I’ve been looking for hickory nuts, I’d like to try one myself, but I only find shells, already brown and broken in quarters, the nuts long gone.
