Nature's Way

Gifts of bones- a skull and a mannequin hand from under the chicken house. The skull is self-explanatory- some large cat hunting chickens and met it's doom...but the hand? go figure..

Yesterday was an off day, and after writing about the darling bunnies I came home to find them all dead but one. That one ran off and is living under an azalea bush- the others showed no sign of harm or sickness, they were plump and fat and furry but all dead in the nest. horrible. I buried them, cried over them, and we talked about all the 'what might of happened'...... but we will never know. The sudden change in temperature? An illness or genetic default? I don't know, it worries me- not so much knowing that they are dead, dead happens, but not knowing *what* happened. I hope the other one makes it.

It's funny, I hate it when an animal dies- breaks my heart a bit, even if it is just a bunny- but I love bones. I had such fun yesterday figuring out what the skull was, I looked it up (I thought it was a cat, but it is quite large- I am right, definitely feline- perhaps a very large domestic or a bob cat of some kind...I didn't think we had those around here but the bio folks at school say we do). I went upstairs and hobnobbed with Hunt- the other taxidermist type- and we ended up telling sea-turtle stories. I've found two- one at Nags Head, one at Southport...neither with a skull...he topped me by finding a whole one on Bird Island and bringing it back section by section on a surfboard. His most recent find was an owl skeleton at Huntington Beach (went camping with the wife and kids- got distracted) mine was most of a deer at the end of my road. (not counting the mystery cat skull which is AWESOME)... anyway, I've always wanted my own museum or collection place. Loved the natural history section of Carnegie Mellon more than the art section- any day! I'd get lost for hours in the horns-and-bones, the trays of study skins and butterflies, the spooky back hall with the really old mounts of endangered species. The dodo bird, a gorilla, a diorama of lions attacking a camel driver... I'd draw, and study them- just enjoy them for hours.

Is funny you know, I wonder what this man of mine thinks of me and my passion for junk and bones... I could seriously care less about store bought gifts- this is what wins my heart! And he likes black licorice, looks good in a kilt and is kindhearted....