This postcard I’m sending you today is a bit out of season. I hope you won’t mind. It shows the beauty of Muskoka during autumn but was one of those pictures that I had to stash away for a while. I can’t have dad find out I was playing on the roof again. For some reason it always bothers him. You know how I don’t like to be a bother so I now wisely do all these things in secret. I know he feels much better that way. It’s my way of being thoughtful and helpful, and besides, somebody has to go up there every now and then to collect all our toys that get stuck on the roof!
On this day I rescued the usual toys: A Frisbee, kite, model airplane, hockey pucks and some pretend drones we made out of sticks, pine cones and parts of cereal boxes. But, the real purpose of the mission was to rescue a teddy bear, a special favorite bear we call “Beary”.
If you know how Otters play and the things we invent then it’s not unusual at all to hear about a teddy bear getting stuck on the roof. It happens all the time. But for those who don’t know how things work around here I’ll explain. One fine autumn day my brothers and I wanted to see Beary fly so we made a parachute for him, threw him high into the air and watched him float back down to earth. It worked well for a few flights until a breeze carried him to the roof and tangled his parachute in the chimney.
We tried to reach Beary with long branches, and when that failed we got our fishing rods and cast lines up on the roof hoping to snag Beary and drag him down. We lost a lot of dad’s favorite fishing lures on the roof that day. Luckily, a few weeks later he ended up finding most of them when he went up to clean the chimneys. It’s weird that dad never said anything about it but he did move his tackle box to the highest shelf in the garage. I found that disappointing, and a bit insulting too. Has he not learned yet how good I am at climbing!?
We tried everything to rescue Beary but nothing worked. He remained stuck there for days and looked pretty soggy and cold. I had no choice but to go up there and get him myself. While dad was out at the woodpile busily cutting and splitting firewood I seized the opportunity to squirrel my way up onto the roof to rescue Beary and the rest of the toys. While up there I took a photo of the great view of colorful trees around our house. I knew it would make a nice postcard for you.
Dad started calling out for some help to stack firewood so I had to get off the roof in a hurry. Luckily I had a plan – a big parachute attached to Beary. I was most curious to find out what it would be like to float down from the roof and land gently on the lawn. I inched my way to the edge of the roof and looked at the long drop below, then unfurled the parachute and waited for a breeze to fill it up with air. I held on to Beary’s feet and raised him above my head, holding him there until the perfect moment to jump arrived. A breeze filled the parachute with air, I felt it tugging on my arms like a kite so I knew it was time. I jumped.
Sometime later, I’m not sure how long, I awoke to see dad standing over me looking most puzzled. As he paused to assess the situation I felt sure I was about to get in big trouble. Apparently, finding me with a mouthful of turf, groaning on the lawn under a garbage bag, tangled in strings, clinging to a soggy teddy bear, wasn’t a good enough clue. He never did figure out what had happened. He just asked me to spit out the lawn, replace the divot neatly, and come help stack firewood. Then he wandered away muttering something about how lucky I was to have landed on Beary.
I sure dodged a bullet that day! I’m really lucky that dad hardly ever figures stuff out later after I’ve figured it out first. He doesn’t have a clue about this one. I almost feel sorry for him and part of me wants to bring him up to speed, but I know it’s not in my best interests to feel that sorry.
I hope you like the picture, but you all have to promise to never tell my dad that you saw this! Thanks friends! You all are the best!
Otter
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