June 8, 2002

Flora and fauna abounding

Through A Glass Darkly, by John Myers, Internet Photojournalist

The past few days, the flora and fauna of Rockingham have been abounding in my life, to the point I'm beginning to wonder about Adam's admonition to exercise dominion over nature.

I've recently become a homeowner again, and will be moving into 2020 Pinedale Road in the Panglewood subdivision of Rockingham with my new bride, who I'm importing here.

She's moving from Pennsylvania -- thank God my great-great grandfather has long been dead, though he may be spinning in his grave over in Anson County over the news that a Myers descended from a Civil War veteran is about to marry a Yankee.

My daddy grew up in the household with great-grandfather John S. Myers, and often said he was 21 before he found out damn Yankee was two words. I'm not sure if he was joking.

Anyway, no fool like an old fool, so I'm getting married again, but I have to say I am marrying better than she is. My intended, Wendy Riggs of Shippensburg, Pa., will be teaching school here in Richmond County and is one of the kindest, gentlest, most loving souls I have ever met and I feel privileged to marry her.

Even if she is a Yankee. But she's lived in North Carolina before, and has relatives here, so she will be a fine Southerner.

But to get back to the flora and fauna, one of the first things I discovered about our new home on Pinedale Road is that the neighborhood is home to a family of pure-white squirrels.

I suppose to be exact about it, they are albino grey squirrels, but they're as white as the Lone Ranger's famous horse Silver, and almost as tame. White squirrels don't do well in the wild as it's hard to hide from predators when you have a white hide.

But they have few natural enemies in Panglewood, leaving aside the occasional prowling house cat or dog, but they seem to be far too quick and alert for that to be any problem to them.

My new neighbor, Sandy Baldwin, told me about them and sure enough, the next day as I pulled into my drive to check on some work under way on our new house, there he was. At least I guess it's a he.

It was a white squirrel, gender unknown, who was scampering across my front yard and up a tree. He paused and looked at me in my white Camry, perhaps wondering about this new stranger in his neighborhood as I wondered about him.

I have seen grey squirrels in abundance out the window of my rented home at 312 Deweese Ave. every morning since I moved in nearly a year ago, but had never before seen a white one.

Until this past Saturday morning. As I looked out my kitchen window into the back yard, lo and behold, there was a white squirrel several blocks, perhaps a mile, away from Panglewood.

Obviously, there must be several families of these critters, and I am told they've been around in the area for at least 10 years.

I'm proud to be living in the company of white squirrels and will share a photo of them whenever I can manage to get one.

But I'm not so proud of two other items of flora and fauna, one of each, which came with my new home. No sooner had I gotten the pool cleaned out than a bull frog moved back in.

Perhaps he was one of the trio who were dispossessed of their home by the pool cleaners. He seemed quite pleased with himself as he swam around in the chlorinated water, and had obviously played "dodge the net" before as he proved too elusive for me.

And the flora in question is poison oak, growing on my new pool fence. I'm not allergic to it, but my wife-to-be is, so the poison oak has got to go. And so does the bull frog, too. He doesn't bother me, but she won't share her pool with him.

Oh, the joys of home ownership. The white squirrels have a new friend, but the bull frog and the poison oak are out of here.