Offerings

Most days Ed and Reub and I go on multiple short walks. Sometimes these excursions are ordinary and once in awhile they aren't.

A couple of weeks ago we came upon wood rat nests on and above the path, not far from the house at all, a one minute walk.

Funny, private little creatures minding their own business, kind of like me.

Wood rats are pack rats. I take them offerings: bay leaves, acorns, a pop-top, a green bean. These objects have moved a few inches, all of them, as if they have been examined. The green bean was mostly consumed. I feel appreciated, but I am not certain.

I imagine a little rodent, dressed during the day in a tiny mid-18th century French gown, blue, enjoying haricots verts, waiting for nightfall, when she changes into the attire of a lady bandit... oh never mind. It's probably not so. But there is no proof, really, that she's just an ordinary rat. We do not know for sure.

Here's the thing...

Today I set out with Ed and Reub down the path.

I squinted...in the middle of the path which is used almost exclusively by myself and my dogs, and just 20 feet before we come to the rats' abodes...

...is a can of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer.

I was born and raised breathing the fumes of the Pabst brewery's hops in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I can't help but think I am being given an offering. A perfect gift, but from whom?

Call it the remnant of a kid's unfulfilled experiment in the woods. I don't know, though. Seems like the kid would have finished the beer, or hidden it. And that expiration date, does it mean the 22nd of this year, or will this can last until 2214? You tell me.

But I know this. That PBR was totally meant for me, no matter who left it. I wish to believe that it was offered by my friends, the Dusky-Footed Wood Rats. I don't know where they got it.