Little Furry Corpses
Tuesday, March 13th, 2007 04:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tamaranthI've been thinking about little furry corpses* today.
(The cats are fine. Or warm and purry and stretchy, anyway.)
Spring's in the air, the daffodils and primroses are blooming, and the local beasties are coming out of their lairs and taking a deep breath of fresh air: after which (observation suggests) some suicidal urge drives them to frolic on the tarmac, where they quickly become roadkill.
Over the last few days I've seen badgers and rabbits and foxes and squirrels, in various states of death from 'having a rest in the middle of the road' to 'red and bloody ruin'. This is my first encounter, as a driver, with vernal carnage on the roads, and I find it quite distressing. The thought of an animal surviving the autumn and winter and then being killed on the road -- sheer waste, since it's unlikely that the corpse will become dinner for something else! -- is a sad one.
I'm sure there are drivers who don't care if they hit something. Equally, I've encountered some of the most ridiculously cocksure and macho squirrels ever along the Newdigate Road. I swear they're playing chicken. They make schoolchildren look sedate and sensible.
So, today I was driving along, "hello clouds hello sky hello daffodils" etc, and suddenly, going around a blind bend, I had to brake sharply because there was an animal in the road.
In fact there were several.
And they had people on their backs.
People swigging sherry and pints of bitter: people laughing and chatting and, grudgingly, walking their horses back into the pub carpark so that they could graciously permit me to drive along the public highway.
Heaven help any fox that -- unlike the disintegrating corpse on the hardshoulder of the A264 -- has survived the winter, the traffic, the lack of food, the snow. Survival! Spring! And the opportunity to get chased for miles and torn to pieces by a baying pack.
Roadkill's probably a kinder fate, really. And it leaves a prettier corpse.
*This phrase, used by Garry Kilworth in a novel I read recently, has the power to bring tears to my eyes.
(The cats are fine. Or warm and purry and stretchy, anyway.)
Spring's in the air, the daffodils and primroses are blooming, and the local beasties are coming out of their lairs and taking a deep breath of fresh air: after which (observation suggests) some suicidal urge drives them to frolic on the tarmac, where they quickly become roadkill.
Over the last few days I've seen badgers and rabbits and foxes and squirrels, in various states of death from 'having a rest in the middle of the road' to 'red and bloody ruin'. This is my first encounter, as a driver, with vernal carnage on the roads, and I find it quite distressing. The thought of an animal surviving the autumn and winter and then being killed on the road -- sheer waste, since it's unlikely that the corpse will become dinner for something else! -- is a sad one.
I'm sure there are drivers who don't care if they hit something. Equally, I've encountered some of the most ridiculously cocksure and macho squirrels ever along the Newdigate Road. I swear they're playing chicken. They make schoolchildren look sedate and sensible.
So, today I was driving along, "hello clouds hello sky hello daffodils" etc, and suddenly, going around a blind bend, I had to brake sharply because there was an animal in the road.
In fact there were several.
And they had people on their backs.
People swigging sherry and pints of bitter: people laughing and chatting and, grudgingly, walking their horses back into the pub carpark so that they could graciously permit me to drive along the public highway.
Heaven help any fox that -- unlike the disintegrating corpse on the hardshoulder of the A264 -- has survived the winter, the traffic, the lack of food, the snow. Survival! Spring! And the opportunity to get chased for miles and torn to pieces by a baying pack.
Roadkill's probably a kinder fate, really. And it leaves a prettier corpse.
*This phrase, used by Garry Kilworth in a novel I read recently, has the power to bring tears to my eyes.
