Editor:
Re: Racoon city looms, Jan. 26 letters.
This is a response to the letter writer who, in an apparent state of hysteria, seems to regard rats and raccoons as harbingers of the apocalypse.
Have no fear. Keep your yard tidy, your garbage enclosed and your mind open to the unity of life and all will be well. Or you can ask yourself when was the last time you heard a frog, saw a blue jay or glimpsed a fox? Where are they now? Everyone knows. Gone. Scattered in this great dispersal.
But at least the rat you so revile and fear and castigate scampered across your yard and the raccoon that shares your enmity curled up upon your porch. No one would want them in the house, of course, but in seeing them, instead of feeling horror we might feel honoured and say, “Welcome, fellow citizen, little survivor. Lend me your presence, and I will lend you mine.”
Perry Walker, Surrey