All Our Friends

Chapter 4 Ricky, Rocky and the Three Racketeers

With the bulk of our yard work behind us and only a few touch-up painting projects scheduled for inside the trailer, we were free to relish our first jobless summer. While we were employed, we never joined the masses in their summer exodus southward, and preferred to stay around home and hike in the country on the weekends. Of course there were no beer gardens or country inns to hike to on Mayne Island like there were in the countryside surrounding Nuremberg, but there were bays, beaches and parks to explore. Our greatest luxury was that we could go where we wanted when we felt like it and stay as long as we cared.

On the night of the summer solstice we returned home from a picnic party to the serendipitous smells and sounds of the season. For a few minutes we lingered under the stars and listened to night’s lullaby when a warbling we could not associate with any bird or creature issued from the upper woods. Figuring we would have the opportunity to identify it another time, we turned in.

A couple of weeks later we were sitting outside after supper when we heard that same warbling accompanied by some rustling in our neighbour’s woods. I stood up just in time to spot a small masked face peering through the deer fence. We held our breaths while the mother, we hoped, climbed into our yard, but we had to wait another week before Raggedy Ann suddenly appeared on Bandit’s big cedar log with a kitten-sized baby behind her. She seemed about to come down to the garden stage when a frantic cooing in the woods turned into a high-pitched shrieking, and in a flash she took off with her kit scurrying behind her.

A few days later while we were doing the supper dishes, a loud chorus of cooing announced activity again on the big cedar log. Lined up side by side this time were three raccoon babies! Immediately we slipped out of the trailer and slid onto the bench outside the door. The three kits continued to wail and sing while Raggedy Ann, we assumed, checked to see if the coast was clear. When Putzi appeared at the top of the stone steps, we had the explanation to her recent appetite and aggressive behaviour toward Foxy! When Putzi whistled, all three kits slid, tumbled and bounced down the steep stone steps to the garden stage where they huddled tightly around their mother.

Now, cute may be a word that is scorned in literary circles and over-used in colloquial language, but I can think of no better one for baby raccoons with their spiky ringed tails, shoe button eyes, and blunt noses with the smudge of a mask that makes them look as if they’ve been playing make-up artist with Dad’s shoe cream. Breathlessly we watched their investigations for awhile, then wondered if a tasty treat might encourage their mother to let us enjoy them for a little longer. We hated to risk scaring them off, but my husband took a chance and glided towards them with a dish of food.

At first the three kits scooted for cover and dived into the salal, but at Putzi’s signal they emerged and collected around her. The dog food, like the stone steps, was almost too big for them to handle, and the two larger kits succeeded in spitting out more than they could chew or swallow. All three showed keen interest in the Rubbermaid water container my husband had set out recently on the garden stage. After hoisting themselves up onto the rim of the container like children climbing monkey bars, they see-sawed and dipped their noses into the water, which they drank as it dripped into their mouths. Their visit had made our day, and we could hardly wait for the next one.

One beautiful Saturday afternoon in early August, that my husband and I fondly remember as Big Baby Day, we happened to be sitting front row centre in a shady spot under the big-leaf maple tree near the garden stage when Putzi appeared with her family. I was not sure how Putzi would react to our being so close, but she looked straight at us and only growled. Her warning was not intended to threaten us, as we soon came to understand, but to keep her babies in line. This time they stayed for over an hour, and my husband was able to take our first baby pictures.