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1 " How can it not exist? What does that—” A tiny grey body shot in front of the Land Rover. “Squirrel!”Mad Rogan swerved to the side, trying to avoid the suicidal beast. The SUV hit a curb and jumped. For a terrifying second, we almost flew, weightless. My heart leaped into my throat. The heavy vehicle landed back on the pavement with a thud. The squirrel leapt into the grass on the other side.I remembered to breathe. “Thank you for not killing the squirrel.”“You’re welcome, although now I want to go back and strangle it. "
― Ilona Andrews , Burn for Me (Hidden Legacy, #1)
2 " The lizard brain is hungry, scared, angry, and horny.The lizard brain only wants to eat and be safe.The lizard brain will fight (to the death) if it has to, but would rather run away. It likes a vendetta and has no trouble getting angry.The lizard brain cares what everyone else thinks, because status in the tribe is essential to its survival.A squirrel runs around looking for nuts, hiding from foxes, listening for predators, and watching for other squirrels. The squirrel does this because that's all it can do. All the squirrel has is a lizard brain.The only correct answer to 'Why did the chicken cross the road?' is 'Because it's lizard brain told it to.' Wild animals are wild because the only brain they posses is a lizard brain.The lizard brain is not merely a concept. It's real, and it's living on the top of your spine, fighting for your survival. But, of course, survival and success are not the same thing.The lizard brain is the reason you're afraid, the reason you don't do all the art you can, the reason you don't ship when you can. The lizard brain is the source of the resistance. "
― Seth Godin , Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?
3 " This afternoon, being on Fair Haven Hill, I heard the sound of a saw, and soon after from the Cliff saw two men sawing down a noble pine beneath, about forty rods off. I resolved to watch it till it fell, the last of a dozen or more which were left when the forest was cut and for fifteen years have waved in solitary majesty over the sprout-land. I saw them like beavers or insects gnawing at the trunk of this noble tree, the diminutive manikins with their cross-cut saw which could scarcely span it. It towered up a hundred feet as I afterward found by measurement, one of the tallest probably in the township and straight as an arrow, but slanting a little toward the hillside, its top seen against the frozen river and the hills of Conantum. I watch closely to see when it begins to move. Now the sawers stop, and with an axe open it a little on the side toward which it leans, that it may break the faster. And now their saw goes again. Now surely it is going; it is inclined one quarter of the quadrant, and, breathless, I expect its crashing fall. But no, I was mistaken; it has not moved an inch; it stands at the same angle as at first. It is fifteen minutes yet to its fall. Still its branches wave in the wind, as it were destined to stand for a century, and the wind soughs through its needles as of yore; it is still a forest tree, the most majestic tree that waves over Musketaquid. The silvery sheen of the sunlight is reflected from its needles; it still affords an inaccessible crotch for the squirrel’s nest; not a lichen has forsaken its mast-like stem, its raking mast,—the hill is the hulk. Now, now’s the moment! The manikins at its base are fleeing from their crime. They have dropped the guilty saw and axe. How slowly and majestic it starts! as it were only swayed by a summer breeze, and would return without a sigh to its location in the air. And now it fans the hillside with its fall, and it lies down to its bed in the valley, from which it is never to rise, as softly as a feather, folding its green mantle about it like a warrior, as if, tired of standing, it embraced the earth with silent joy, returning its elements to the dust again. But hark! there you only saw, but did not hear. There now comes up a deafening crash to these rocks , advertising you that even trees do not die without a groan. It rushes to embrace the earth, and mingle its elements with the dust. And now all is still once more and forever, both to eye and ear.I went down and measured it. It was about four feet in diameter where it was sawed, about one hundred feet long. Before I had reached it the axemen had already divested it of its branches. Its gracefully spreading top was a perfect wreck on the hillside as if it had been made of glass, and the tender cones of one year’s growth upon its summit appealed in vain and too late to the mercy of the chopper. Already he has measured it with his axe, and marked off the mill-logs it will make. And the space it occupied in upper air is vacant for the next two centuries. It is lumber. He has laid waste the air. When the fish hawk in the spring revisits the banks of the Musketaquid, he will circle in vain to find his accustomed perch, and the hen-hawk will mourn for the pines lofty enough to protect her brood. A plant which it has taken two centuries to perfect, rising by slow stages into the heavens, has this afternoon ceased to exist. Its sapling top had expanded to this January thaw as the forerunner of summers to come. Why does not the village bell sound a knell? I hear no knell tolled. I see no procession of mourners in the streets, or the woodland aisles. The squirrel has leaped to another tree; the hawk has circled further off, and has now settled upon a new eyrie, but the woodman is preparing [to] lay his axe at the root of that also. "
― Henry David Thoreau , The Journal, 1837-1861
4 " Shaking his head, Tobin turned back to his picnic spread, and there, sitting on the end of the checkered cloth, and helping himself to one of Tobin’s cupcakes, was a tiny brown squirrel.Tobin blinked in surprise.The squirrel was exceptionally bold. He made absolutely no move to leave, despite Tobin’s frown, and merely stuffed more pink icing into his mouth with one tiny paw. His ears were tufted into small points, and he tilted his head to the side as he surveyed Tobin with bright, inquisitive eyes.Tobin had to laugh. “Well, I suppose I don’t mind sharing with you, little guy, even if you did eat one of my cupcakes,” Tobin chuckled to himself.“I should hope so. Frankly, I’m surprised that you thought you could even eat five cupcakes all by yourself,” the squirrel replied airily. "
5 " When their chatter died to a contented lull, a small red squirrel ventured out of the oak grove and turned to the side, watching them with one bright black eye." An intruder," Annabelle observed, with a delicate yawn.Evie rolled to her stomach and tossed a bread crust in the squirrel's direction. He froze and stared at the tantalizing offering, but was too timid to advance. Evie tilted her head, her hair glittering in the sun as if it had been overlaid with a net of rubies. " Poor little thing," she said softly, casting another crust at the timid squirrel. This one landed a few inches closer, and his tail twitched eagerly. " Be brave," Evie coaxed. " Go on and take it." Smiling tolerantly, she tossed another crust, which landed a scant few inches from him. " Oh, Mr. Squirrel," Evie reproved. " You're a dreadful coward. Can't you see that no one's going to harm you?" In a sudden burst of initiative, the squirrel seized the tidbit and scampered off with his tail quivering. Looking up with a triumphant smile, Evie saw the other wallflowers staring at her in drop-jawed silence. " Wh-what is it?" she asked, puzzled.Annabelle was the first to speak. " Just now, when you were talking to that squirrel, you didn't stammer." " Oh." Suddenly abashed, Evie lowered her gaze and grimaced. " I never stammer when I'm talking to children or animals. I don't know why. "
6 " And to the little Squirrel who lived in the fir-tree, and was lonely, he said, 'Where is my mother?' And the Squirrel answered, 'Thou hast slain mine. Dost thou seek to slay thine also? "
― Oscar Wilde , The Star-Child and Other Tales
7 " Have you ever had one of those moments when the world around you comes to a crashing halt? When your heart beats so loudly that it drowns out every other sound? When the universe collapses to a single, solitary, radiant point of energy? This was one of those moments for me. The last time I heard the name Sandra Flax, Clinton was still screwing that ugly chick from Arkansas." The squirrel cocked his head to the side. " Not Hillary, the other one, before the chubby kid." The squirrel still looked confused. " Fine! It was 1989. Anyway, the sound of Sandra's name sent shivers down my spine and reawakened a hatred so venomous, at one time I thought it would be my undoing. "
8 " Never did he fail to respond savagely to the chatter of the squirrel he had first met on the blasted pine. "
― Jack London