Lessons learned while feeding squirrels

ILLUSTRATION by JOE MCGARRY

Riding my bike along Bixby Park on Broadway when I notice a lady with three overstuffed bags feeding a squirrel that is leaning towards her from his position on a tree.

“Hi. You mind if I take a picture of you feeding the squirrels?”

She smiles and says that she doesn’t, and asks if I plan on selling them to the paper.

I tell her I work for a couple of the free local newspapers, and she tells me that she reads them both.

“I’ll feed him again when he finishes burying the one he’s got,” she says. “They like to eat one and bury one.”

“What are you feeding him?” I ask.

“Almonds,” she says. “I got no teeth so I can’t eat them.”

She smiles big so that I can see her red, barren gums.

“Mostly they eat peanuts, but they have to tear the shell off those.”

“What’s your name?” I ask her.

“Kristy with a K, ain’t no other way,” she tells me.

I ask Kristy if she lives around here.

“Well, I’m homeless right now,” she says. “It’s hard being homeless in Long Beach. Although, the mayor we have now is better than the lady we had before for 12 years or whatever before him. Foster leaves us alone as long as we’re not doing anything bad.”

“Beverly O’Neill didn’t like homeless people?” I ask.

“Oh, she didn’t like us at all. She closed a homeless shelter to build a parking lot.”

I tell her I didn’t know that.

“Well, you can’t make any money off homeless people,” Kristy says.

Kristy tells me that the worst thing about being homeless in Long Beach is the lines.

“You have to get to the shelter early to line up for a place to sleep. Get in another long line for something to eat. It’s not like that in Alhambra. They seem to care more.”

“Why did you leave Alhambra?” I ask.

“My mother was cremated and her ashes were spread in the ocean here.” She pauses, lost in thought before she continues in a quieter voice. “And I wanted to see Long Beach again. It was stupid of me.”

“The squirrels seem to be pretty comfortable around you,” I say, trying to bring her back to a happier topic.

“Oh, they are. Sometimes they’re skittish because the children chase them, but they come right up to me.”

“They ever bite you?” I ask.

“No, they never have,” she says. “Squirrels are good, not like opossums at all.”

“Opossums are good, too,” a lady sitting close by says, interjecting herself into the conversation.

“They are?” Kristy asks her. “

I raised one before. Trained her to use the kitty litter box too,” Opossum Lady says.

Kristy concedes that perhaps she has misjudged the nocturnal creatures. But they both agree that they love the squirrels that live in the park—and, as if to show that the affection is mutual, five or six squirrels gather in a circle around them, curious as to whether there will be any more food doled out this afternoon.

“Anyway, it’s good you’re taking pictures,” says the Opossum Lady. “A lot of people think that squirrels and opossums are bad and this will help raise awareness that they’re not.”

Tags: Bixby Park, homeless, Long Beach, opossums, squirrels