Bridget and the Squirrely Squirrel
Written by Ruth Holmes

Bridget woke up today and quickly thought about what she thinks each day. “Oh my, I’m gorgeous”.   

She has everything she wants. She lives in a beautiful and spacious birdcage that happens to sit in a perfect spot where the sun rays visit each morning and afternoon. 

She loves to sit in front of her mirror on her favorite high perch and admire her reflection. More than several times each day she tilts her head ever so slightly so that she has a perfect view of herself and all her beautiful feathers. She loves to watch the sunshine make her feathers glisten with white, red, yellow, and deep blue highlights. She looks with her right eye and then she tilts her feathered head just a bit and looks with her left eye. She stretches, spreads her long colorful wings, and then shakes her long and feathered tail. And then Bridget thinks to herself. “Wow, I am one Gorgeous bird!” 

Bridget knows everyone who sees her admires her. “Oh, what a beautiful macaw,” they say. So, she preens some more, fluffs her feathers, and sits in the sun allowing admiration from all directions to softly shower her. 

But Bridget is so caught up in her own beauty she regularly forgets to pay attention to anything else. She is focused on herself and doesn’t notice what is happening right under her beak.  

Each morning Bridget wakes up and finds delicious food that just happens to appear in her cage. She has fresh sunflower seeds, slices of apples and oranges, and nuts and seeds. She has everything a beautiful macaw could dream of eating. 

All day she perches in her cage sunning herself and admiring herself. “Oh, my life is wonderful, and I am a beauty “. She thinks again as she fluffs her feathers.  

One day as she sat basking in the sun she dozed off.  Just taking a little snooze for her beauty sleep. She suddenly awoke to a strange noise at the bottom of her cage. She tilted her head and looked down. “Aawwk!” A fat furry squirrely squirrel with a big bushy tail was eating her food. There he sat oblivious to Bridget and stuffing his little face.  He greedily picked up orange slices and then some sunflower seeds and chomped away. He gingerly tossed the empty seed shells over his shoulder and grabbed more. Bridget was flabbergasted and watched as the fat furry squirrely squirrel ate her sunflower seeds, grabbed her apple slices and stuffed his cheeks. This was war! “AWWKK” Bridget squawked.  

Bridget squawked “AWWKK” and flapped her wings. She thought, “This is just not right. He didn’t even ask. Forget that. I don’t want to share”. Bridget didn’t want to be bothered either. 

Bridget’s squawk was very loud and shrill. Anyone who heard it was startled that such a sound could come from her.  

 The squirrely squirrel heard the squawk and was so startled he jumped backwards, did a complete somersault and smacked his head against the cage. All the food he held in his furry paws flew up into the air. He tried to quickly get up but lost his balance.  Bridget continued squawking loudly and then quickly began climbing down to defend her food, the squirrely squirrel scurried around and around trying to get out of the cage, but he was so confused he just grabbed onto the nearest rod of the cage and hung on for dear life hoping Bridget was so focused on her food that wouldn’t see him hanging upside down in the corner of the cage. Bridget kept hollering and squawking.  

“Such a beautiful bird and such a horrible squawk” thought the squirrely squirrel. When the squirrel heard Bridget squawking he got so many chills that his fur stood straight up all down his back from his head all the way down to the end of his bushy tail. 

Bridget reached the bottom of the cage and sat by her food and stuffed her beak. She was not going to leave her plate until all her food was finished.  She ignored the squirrely squirrel. She didn’t want to share. The squirrel watched her and continued to hang on for dear life.  Bridget ate until she was so full she struggled to climb back up to her perch. When she reached the top of the cage her tummy was so full she couldn’t help herself but fall asleep. The squirrel saw that Bridget was asleep and took advantage of quickly climbing down the side of the cage and made his escape. He didn’t want Bridget to come after him and he didn’t want to hear her squawk again. 

So, the next morning Bridget did what she always did and didn’t change a thing.  She admired herself and quickly ate all her food because it was hers. She forgot everything that happened yesterday. She didn’t look around as she sunbathed and fell asleep as soon as her tummy was full. And just like yesterday, the squirrely squirrel waited to have lunch!