Nature’s Satire 7/31/2022

By: Jennifer Richardson Holt

I have always said that irony follows me around like a lost puppy. And truly, I do tend to find myself in the throes of it a very significant amount.  As of late, I am not sure if I have stumbled upon more or if somehow I am just paying better attention but I have found ironic moments around every corner.  I am not exactly sure what I did to earn what I would equate to life giving me a good natured jab, but, such is the case.  Now irony isn’t necessarily bad it is just, well ironic.  Yes, I realize that was a blazingly underwhelming statement.  I daresay my being prone to such things may very well have something to do with my fluency and possibly excessive use of sarcasm and dry humor. I feel like perhaps you put enough of that type of thing out there it somewhat returns to you.  Again, do not misunderstand me that I think I am victim to some plague. I would not even call being privy to a certain amount of irony a misfortune.  Usually at most it merits a shake of the head. Occasionally it even gets a bemused chuckle. Clearly I must think it has at least some inherent entertainment value since I am obviously currently writing and about to write more about it.  Let us hope I am not wrong in this analysis.

It all started with me thinking I was rather clever.  That was probably the problem to begin with. I was feeling quite proud of an idea I had and I likely got a bit too big for my britches. This is likely why I needed to be taken down a notch with an ironic moment.  My concept was that I wanted to have iced coffee and since I didn’t want my coffee to be watered down with the ice (though coffee shops pull it off I am not privy to their methodology) I decided to make for myself some coffee ice cubes.  I was right pleased with my idea and proceeded to brew some coffee, pour it into trays and freeze it.  Well upon going to execute my beverage I discovered that apparently frozen coffee is rather different from frozen water.  This seems a rather odd thing but I assure you that in at least this one case it was very true.  I couldn’t get the tray to twist as one does to release the cubes. This stuff was frozen like concrete. Even in beating said tray on my granite counters and even stabbing at them with knives, the frozen coffee only shed a chip or two and refused to budge. The tray of cubes was also surprisingly heavy. I mean it is water with bean juice added! What in the world turned it to cold lead I do not know.  After wrestling far longer than anticipated, one single cube decided to release. Said cube promptly fell with the full force of the beating it was getting. It flung its disconcerting weight directly onto my big toe.  Yes, it hurt.  I was frustrated but moved on desperately trying to create the drink that I had thusly worked far too hard for.  It was only after this unexpectedly monumental task that I discovered that this mere bit of frozen drink had literally burst my toe. I mean the full gamut with blood and the works. Forgive me for my minimally graphic description but there was even splatter where the toe had split upon impact. No, I didn’t expect such either and found it all rather overly dramatic for the situation at hand.  So, me thinking I was the smartest connoisseur of brewed beverage led to rather gruesome injury. This will certainly teach me to toot my own horn. I don’t even have a good story to tell about my bandaged toe, just an embarrassing one.

The same day I was out in my back yard and irony reared its head yet again, yet without gore this time.  I had filled a bird feeder hanging on a tree with the usual mix of seeds that birds are so fond of. Well, of course, being the presumptive creatures that they are, the squirrels assumed this was a gift for them and had proceeded to employ all sorts of methods to balance and dangle from said feeder to gorge themselves.  Upon entering the yard I heard the very loud fuss of an angry squirrel. The volume stayed elevated and perhaps I sensed it but it wasn’t long before I realized that the rodent in question was yelling at me.  In his thieving acrobatics he had managed to knock the feeder down and was thoroughly disgusted that the seed was scattered about and just any old ground dwelling animal could now get to it. I informed him that it was not for him to begin with, and if he hadn’t been pulling his flying trapeze shenanigans on the feeder it would not be on the ground.  I told him he may as well be a burglar scolding a homeowner for keeping their jewelry box in their house rather than open on the front porch.  The squirrel didn’t seem to put much stock in my pointing out the irony in his disdain as they aren’t known for listening to reason.   But I admit I did have a chuckle at his expense.  It wasn’t much of one as I did have a bandaged toe for ironic reasons of my own so I thought it best not to rub it in his fuzzy face.

There are cows near my home and if you have ever seen a calf having a meal from its mother you might have seen this next moment. I am not exactly sure if it qualifies as ironic but when watching the spindly leg baby suckle it is all precious, until they do that sudden ramming of their head up into their mother’s gut and the adorability turns to something inducing a grimace.  Maybe it’s more just a startling contrast than irony when helpless baby goes to violent ingrate but since it begins with all the warm fuzzy feelings and morphs to the desire to smack said calf, seems a tad ironic to me.  Heaven forbid they have one of those random bursts of excitement that calves are want to do with kicking and frolicking. Lord help the mama then.  She might have to dish out a little irony herself and apply a hoof to his hind quarter.

Maybe that is what irony is all about. Every story I’ve just told seems be teaching a lesson.  I wouldn’t call any of them a full blown “learning the hard way” scenario but more a mild inconvenience that one can be glad wasn’t any worse. It seems to be something you can still ever so slightly find amusing but a point is gotten across. Maybe I should request more irony in my life?  Perhaps this is the best way to learn and grow; with a smile, a tilt of the head and knowing better next time.