Now for my story.

It was early – I had slept in far too late and was enjoying the break from my hectic start as my sister drove the both of us to work.

It was supposed to be uneventful and the story was supposed to end with both of us arriving at work nice and early.

My expectations were obviously much, much too high.

A small, brown bundle of fur waddled across the road and changed it all.

This sister of mine – who shall not be named because I would like to remain in my currently uninjured state – slowed to a stop to avoiding hitting it, and turned her emergency lights on. We were now sitting at a complete stop in front of the Medicine Hat College.

I may have been the one to ask in hushed tones, “what is it??” — but it wasn’t my lips that uttered the two dreaded words, “baby beaver”.

I accepted this possibility without question – after all, it is the only water loving animal in Alberta, right?

I was immediately horrified by the thought of such a magnificent creature, a symbol of our country, the icon on our nickel, meeting such a terrible fate.

This horror was only compounded by its juvenile nature. Where was its mother? Why was it SO FAR AWAY from the river?

“What can we do? We can’t just leave it here!” The panic and desperation in my voice must have spurred her into action.

She lept from the car (after carefully checking for traffic) and set about trying to shoo the poor little thing off the road.

I sat in the car.

I wasn’t just sitting there idly – oh no. She was being so brave I had to do something to help – lucky me I had just heard the number for Rock 105.3! Everyone knows if you need to tell someone… something… and don’t know who – phone a radio station!

But, I hate talking on the phone. And the thought of being live on air makes my stomach get a little woosy.

Luckily, while my fingers were poised – ready to dial. My amazing sis managed to get the fuzzy ball of brown fur into the grass by the college. Success!!

She jumped back in the car – and we were off. Two heroes! (Well ok, one hero, but I had watched the whole thing very intently!!)

We drove about ten feet.

That’s as far as we got before it darted out in front of us again. We could’ve honked… just kept going…

“It’s going to get run over…” I muttered, more to myself than anything.

I don’t usually try and instigate things… I swear.

She was back out, shooing the animal, and this time I was ready.

With my genius intelligence I recalled the number for the radio station. Amazing! I’m pretty much Einstein!

Poncho answered – and to my incredible surprise I actually managed to make sense. I informed him that there was a baby beaver on the road in front of the college and I wasn’t sure who to phone.

My chest puffed up a little and everything – ‘Look at me! I’m doing a good deed!’

It was only when he asked me if I was certain that it was a beaver that I began to wonder about the whole venture. When the possibility that it was a muskrat was mentioned, I denied it. No no. I couldn’t be that foolish. I know a baby beaver when I see one! Never mind that I hadn’t actually gotten close to it…

I’m just going to say that my thought process was a little jumbled up because as I was trying to form cohesive sentences- I was also watching my sister try and shoo the animal out from under a car that had stopped for her.

Imagine for a moment what that poor driver was thinking as this seeming lunatic ran up to their car and began making shooing motions at the side of it! Very distracting. (As unsafe as it sounds it was very early, and the traffic around was minimal!)

Well kudos to my sis, she got the critter into the grass again (on the complete other side of the road) and got back in the car.

I was still talking to Poncho.

“Who is this?”

I winced – revealing my name?? What would this do to my reputation as an extremely clever individual?

“This is Beth calling.” I said as politely as I could. That conversation just needed to end!

I didn’t want to listen to the radio anymore. I knew that they would be unable to resist airing it. And I was right. There it was – my voice claiming that a poor baby beaver was in the middle of the road.

And at the end of it, “thanks Beth Calling.”

Oooh. How could I have made such a classic blunder?? Wait. Panicking about a lost baby beaver might be worse. Damn.

My face may have been flaming a little bit, but I was doing ok – no one would ever know that it was ME.

Finally, after what seemed like hours, we pulled into the parking lot at work.

The first words that were said to me after I walked in the door? “Hey Beth – were you just on the radio??”

Oh the horror.

After all of this – we still made it to work on time.

Important Notice: Please watch out for beavers near the Medicine Hat College.

Photo courtesy of the unnamed sister’s cell.