Letter to the Editor: “It’s Only a Squirrel”

One day last week, I was driving to work as usual. It was a day like any other – nothing remarkable about the route or weather – when suddenly, a squirrel ran out in front of me. I cringed as I felt the mass of his body lump beneath my tire. Just prior to crushing him under the weight of my SUV, I had – for an instant – seen his face, full of life and purpose, as he carried a large walnut toward his winter harvest. My heart pounded and sank in remorse while waves of nausea washed over me.

This tragic event set the stage for the days that followed: grief written into my face and set deeply behind my eyes. With each breath, I felt the full measure of sorrow at robbing this creature of its deserving life.

“What’s wrong?” people would ask. “I ran over a squirrel,” I’d reply, pushing the words out through the crushing pressure in my chest. Over and over again, my response was met with expressions of bewilderment, and at times amusement, over how anyone could react with such overwhelming remorse. 

“But it’s only a squirrel,” they’d say, smiling. “These things happen.”

Yes, accidents happen. But the insult added to this injury is what has apparently happened to our collective compassion, accountability and respect for the miracle of life. Every day we casually drive past the corpses of animals on our roadways, demolished by our vehicles of mass destruction. But how many of us feel the impact of lives lost as we go about our days immersed in our own agenda? Would we be so cavalier if these were human bodies instead? 

From the driver I once saw plow head on into a flock of geese crossing my road (without so much as a tap to his brakes) to the overall indifference of motorists everywhere, I urge you to consider these words from Albert Schweitzer: “The tragedy of life is what dies inside a man while he lives.” 

Linda Steiner

Egg Harbor, Wisconsin