Week 13 Storytelling: The Onion, The Rose, and The Squirrel

Red Squirrel
Source: Wikipedia

There once was an onion, a rose and a squirrel that all lived together. Now while this might seem like a very odd group of friends to be living together, they actually fit together quite nicely. Each one had a special job to do everyday.

 The onion was in charge of the cooking, for he could add wonderful flavor to the meat and vegetables that he prepared. The rose was in charge of the cleaning, for she could make everything look and smell beautiful by leaving some of her petals around the house. The squirrel was in charge of gathering sticks for the fire, for he could scamper up the trees with ease. He was also in charge of collecting acorns and pecans so that they would have plenty of food to last them through the winter. When they all worked together, things in their house ran very smoothly. However, one day this well-oiled machine of a system came crashing down.

The squirrel had been out since early in the morning gathering sticks and nuts to take back home, when he ran into a field mouse. The field mouse told the squirrel that he thought it was absolutely absurd that he lived with an onion and a rose. The squirrel explained to the field mouse that it was actually quite nice, and explained their system to him. Nevertheless, the field mouse came to the conclusion that it was not fair that the squirrel had to leave the house every morning to come gather sticks and nuts, especially when it was so cold outside, while the onion and the rose worked in the warmth and comfort of their home.

After thinking about this for a few moments, the squirrel decided that the field mouse was right, and he was going to go home and tell the onion and the rose that the arrangement they had was not fair. When the squirrel told this to the onion and the rose, they agreed to rotate tasks with him. From now on, the rose would go out to gather sticks and nuts, the onion would do the cleaning, and the squirrel would do the cooking.

So the next morning, the rose got up early to gather the sticks and the nuts. However, much to her dismay, just as she was almost to the top of an oak tree to gather some acorns, a bird swiped her up and flew off with her.

Meanwhile back at home, the onion began the cleaning. The squirrel came out of his room and asked the onion what that awful smell was. Turned out, the onion had been leaving pieces of his skin around the house. He figured since the rose left her petals around the house, that he should do the same.

The squirrel was very much disgusted by this and fled to the kitchen to try to escape the smell as well as get started on the cooking. He had a nice fire going, got the meat and vegetables in the pot, so things seemed to be going well. However, when he hopped up onto the rim of the pot to stir the meat and vegetables, he accidentally slipped in and burned to death.

The onion went into the kitchen to see what was going on. He was so frightened when he saw what happened to the squirrel that he ran out of the house. Just then, a farmer was walking by and saw him. The farmer scooped up the onion, took him home, and cooked him with his other vegetables for lunch.

Moral of the story: if things are working well, don’t change them.

Author’s Note

This story is based on The Mouse, The Bird, and The Sausage from the Grimm (LibriVox) unit. The plot of the story is basically the same in that each of the characters has a special role; the bird gathers wood, the mouse fetched the water, and the sausage did the cooking. In the original story the bird meets another bird that convinces him that he is doing too much work. So much like in my story, the characters switch roles and it leads to their demise.

I switched up the characters and their roles just a little bit to make it my own. Also, I wanted the moral of the story, as I interpreted it, to be more explicit. I hope you enjoyed!

Bibliography

Book: Grimms’ Fairy Tales

Author: Brothers Grimm

Year: 2008

Web Source: Un-Textbook