I saw two rats on Saturday.
It was a dreamy kind of day; I had an appointment that I was dreading, and was also deep in thought about a project. Rat One was dead. It lay belly up on a sidewalk among a bunch of strewn trash, little rat hands and feet frozen in an upward rictus, as though it was being mugged.
Sorry, little rat, I said into my mask, as I hurried by, side-stepping into the street.
A half an hour later I sat in the back of a mostly empty Metro bus, idling at a light. I looked out and to my right and saw Rat Two scurry across a sidewalk and into the manicured bushes beside an apartment building. Rat Two appeared to be browsing for food, until two women approached, and it scurried back across to the safety of the ivy ground cover next to the street. Then the light changed and the bus accelerated down 15th.
Just before boarding that bus, I watched a persistent crow hopping around in the fresh cedar mulch around newly-planted trees, diligently sorting out smaller, thinner strands. For building a nest, I wondered? A pedestrian approached and the crow swooped up to a nearby utility wire, perched for a moment, and then flew off to a neighboring tree.
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The rat sightings made me think of Project Runway winner Kentaro and his story about being inspired by a dead rat that he later buried. But, upon googling, it seems it was a dead cat. Not a rat. But the story and Tim Gunn's deadpan reaction stay with me.
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