FruitGuy Noir in: Avoiding the Rabbit Hole

By Chris Mittelstaedt
April 25, 2023
Reading Time: 2 mins.

The text came in old school: via Cowbell Morse code. “You’re a little rusty,” my catfish Bicycle mimed to me while I wrote down the incoming message. “Got it,” I quickly flagged back to Bicycle in semaphore, “And no one’s called me Little Rusty since second grade.”

The message was clear: an etymologist had fallen down a naming rabbit hole and needed help.

“If baby rabbits are called “Kits” (stop)

then why are baby ferrets, foxes, honey badgers, muskrats, skunks, squirrels, weasels, and woodchucks also called Kits (stop) ?

Is Ki a root (stop) ?

Do they somehow share biological taxonomy? (end)

I’d seen this before. It was a spinning brain. The need for stable blood sugar and pattern recognition could often overwhelm. You know what they say, a person stuck in a proverbial well is, well, an unwell person stuck well. My job was to snap him out of it.

I hung out of my window and morse-rang my cowbell like an etymologist’s life depended on it.

“Don’t overthink (stop).

Look to nature to snap you out of it (stop).

Eat a piece of whole fruit (stop).

Get outside and smell springtime flowers (stop).

See vibrant green grass (stop).

Then I rang about all the great celebrations to look forward to: April 26 is Stop Food Waste Day & Admin Professionals Day; April 27 is Tell a Story Day, Poem in your Pocket Day & Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day; April 28 is Great Poetry Reading Day & Arbor Day; April 29 is Independent Bookstore Day; and May is nearly here! I closed my message of hope with a small ode to Tubular Bells, which may have been a little much.