Chapter Four Synopsis of Discussion
Week of July 29, 2007
Chapter 4 – Squirrel Finds A Live Nut
This is a cute chapter about the antics of Squirrel. He is a funny little creature
and totally scatterbrained. He has no discipline when it comes to collecting
and storing nuts for the winter season. I believe he would rather play and eat
than think seriously about the upcoming winter. He has good intentions when
he finds a peanut in that he plans to bury it and dig it up later, but his intentions
fly out the window when he decides he is hungry and eats the peanut right away.
Then he reconfirms that he must find more nuts to store away for winter. He
locates a beechnut, buries it, decides he is hungry again and needs a snack,
but he can’t find where he buried the beechnut. He then finds an acorn
and the whole process begins anew.
Ms. Hickory, on the other hand, is much more productive. As she is settled in her nest in the apple tree she is thinking about new clothes for the winter season. She has discovered she is not so dependent upon store goods as when she was living in the corncob house. She has become very creative and filled the nooks of her nest with wild rose hips, partridgeberries and checkerberries. She has rearranged Robin’s nest so as to hang things and has taught herself to stitch and tailor with pine needles. She searches the woods for items of clothing: velvety leaves in beautiful fall colors, mosses, tiny brown cones for buttons, and soft lining of fern fronds for winter underwear. Miss Hickory is “intensely feminine” and spends many enjoyable hours in the woods selecting materials and sewing her new winter wardrobe which is “a model of style and utility.”
She fit so well into the woods that Squirrel did not even see her on one of his outings. He was searching around for the holes where he buried his nuts and talking to himself, when Miss Hickory spoke aloud to him. He was startled by her “sharp and elderly voice.” When he found the courage to follow the voice and saw her, he was enchanted. Miss Hickory tells Squirrel she has been watching him for some time and did not approve of his scatterbrained ways. Poor Squirrel says he was an only child and given all the nuts he wanted so therefore his lack of discipline. When he said the word “nuts”, Miss Hickory started, forgetting momentarily that her head might be of great interest to Squirrel. She pulled her hat down to hide the shape of her head and backed into the thicket of hemlock shoots.
Miss Hickory tells Squirrel that she knows he is one of a large family
and that his mother taught him to hide nuts. He has given her nothing but a
tall story! Squirrel came closer to Miss Hickory and tapped her nose playfully.
He wants to know where she got her head!! That was it for Miss Hickory. She
took off through the forest with Squirrel chasing after her. She thought the
worst, but all Squirrel wanted to do was play. She managed to make it through
the woods and up the apple tree to her nest. She hollered down to Squirrel that
her name was Miss Hickory. Squirrel informs her that he is home and she is aghast
to find out that the both of them will be residing in the apple tree.