The morning carries news of extraterrestrial visitors, which clarifies certain matters regarding the deck.

For years I have observed the squirrel’s behavior with mounting perplexity. The panicked collision with the fence. The graceless attempt at the bird feeder. The fundamental inability to judge distance or trajectory. This is not how earthbound creatures conduct themselves.

Now the pieces arrange themselves into sense. The squirrel is reconnaissance. The erratic movement patterns are not incompetence but coded transmissions to the mothership. The way it pauses on the fence cap, staring directly at nothing—clearly receiving instructions through channels beyond our perception.

This revelation coincides with a Friday that announces itself in all the proper ways. The scoop against the kibble bin at precisely the expected moment. The texture of morning light through the south-facing door, warm enough to suggest the sun patch will be worth claiming later. The distant sound of Dad moving toward the studio, which means the first cookie of the day approaches its natural conclusion.

Gus stretches on the family room sofa, entirely unbothered by interplanetary surveillance operations. He has always possessed an enviable ability to focus on what matters. The squirrel’s origins—terrestrial or otherwise—do not alter the fundamental truth that Frozen Bone Friday begins in approximately nine hours.

From the kitchen comes the particular sound of the coffee grinder, followed by water meeting heated glass. These are the sounds of a day arranging itself according to known principles. Outside, the unseasonable warmth has drawn people from their houses earlier than usual. Through the doggy door drifts the scent of warming pavement and the distant promise of something that might become a car ride.

The news of visitors from elsewhere settles into the morning routine without disruption. If anything, it explains why certain inexplicable things have felt so familiar. The way I sometimes stare at empty corners, seeing something just beyond the edge of recognition. The instinctive certainty that New York City matters, though I have never been there. The feeling that some frequencies exist just outside the range of ordinary hearing.

Perhaps we have all been preparing for this moment without knowing it. The daily practice of loyalty. The attention to small rituals. The understanding that what appears mundane often carries the most significance.

The squirrel scurries across the roof—front to back, as always—but now I hear it differently. Not the simple transit of a creature gathering seeds, but the purposeful movement of an agent completing its morning report. Somewhere above the ponderosas, receivers calibrate and coordinates adjust.

Meanwhile, the cookie jar on the kitchen counter maintains its position, indifferent to cosmic revelations. Some truths transcend species and solar systems.

~P.W.