Cute Murderer

I took this picture through the glass of the dining room window. The raccoon is eating out of the bird feeder, and somehow didn't notice me. He, or one of his family, killed one of my chickens last night. Pansy must have gotten out of the yard before I closed them in for the night and I didn't know she wasn't there. When only five chickens greeted me this morning, I knew immediately what must have happened. I saw a pile of feathers near the fence, telling the story.

There isn't much I can say beyond what I have already said many times before. It is terrible to see nature at work, see the consequences of this ecological system we live in. It's startling how little meaning individual life has in this system, whether it be a spider eating a fly, a raccoon eating a chicken, a human eating a cow, or a shark eating a human.

Seeing Pansy's killer put a different light on things for me. This adorable little animal has as much or as little right to live as Pansy, so how can I make a judgment on which one is more important. Because I love my chickens, does that bestow on them the right to a long, happy life? I'm afraid I'm not that powerful. What does nature care about who or what is loved or not loved by another creature? We all stand alone, equally, when it comes to living or dying.

Our lives, Pansy's and the raccoon's and mine, are all the same. My delight at seeing the raccoon, and my sadness about Pansy, struggle to cancel each other out. I don't know what to feel. I guess the danger for us is that if we don't cultivate the non-objective emotions we feel, we lose our humanness.