Branching Out

Here is something new I’ve been working on. It might become part of a larger project, or this might be it. Who knows.

Living life as a monkey in the wild is a bitch. You have no idea. My name is Ooh. There are about twenty other monkeys here also named Ooh, so it can get confusing.

“Ooh?”
“What mom?”
“I’m not your mom. And I wasn’t talking to you. I was talking to Ooh.”
“Me?”
“No! Ooh, would you please answer me?”
“Yes?”
“No. Ooh on the branch above you. Ooh! OOH!”
“Mom, that Ooh is deaf, remember?”
“I’m not your mom.”

Conversations like this take up about thirty percent of our day, if I’m being honest. Moments like these convinced me to try my own tree out, free of other monkeys. But it turns out that’s hard. Really hard. There’s nobody to scratch my back. So I have to use the bark to do it. Then the bark is all covered in old fur. And that’s gross. The female monkeys think so, anyway.

“Ew is that a dead animal living in your tree?”
“No. That’s where I scratch my back.”
“You scratch your own back?”
“Yup. This tree is alllllll mine.”
“I think I hear my boyfriend Ooh calling me.”
“I’m Ooh.”
“No. No you’re not.”

Plus the fact that I have nobody to help alleviate my fur of bugs. Also, I don’t have bugs to eat off of other monkeys. I know you probably think I live off of a diet of bananas, but that’s just not true. We aren’t sure where that rumor started. We live off of the bugs, as I said, and fruits, nuts, bird eggs, and yes, the occasional banana. Only when there are no humans around to see. We don’t want to propagate the stereotype, obviously.

So after my little experiment of living alone, I moved back. But you probably don’t understand the politics of a monkey troop. It used to be called a barrel until one of our locals came back from some time at a reserve and told us about the human board game. So now we just call it a troop. Why do humans have to ruin everything good? I love bananas!

Anyway, when I came back, it turned out that Ooh moved up to my branch, Oola moved to his, and so on. So here I am on the bottom branch, which SUCKS. Do you know how often the monkey on the lowest branch gets peed on? I do. It’s at least six times a day. Which is about six times too many. And they don’t even warn you until it’s too late.

Let’s not discuss number two, by the way.

Liquid lands on my head.
“Look out below!”
“Ooh, could you warn me BEFORE you start?”
“It wasn’t me, it was Ooh.”

This is my life now. And the bananas are nowhere near me. You’ve seen a banana tree, right? The bananas are all high up. So I either have to ask to have one passed to me, or climb up and get my own.

“Ooh, can you pass me a banana?”
“I’m busy.”
“Not Ooh. Ooh!”
“Me?”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Mom, can you pass me a banana?”
“I’m not your mom.”

Branch level equals power. The higher you are, the less you’re peed on, the more bananas there are right next to you, and the more people want to visit your branch because of the lack of pee and the plentiful bananas. So I never get to entertain. Before, I was halfway up, and some neighbors visited me. But now, I’m alone. I should have stayed in my own tree, except that I like having my bugs removed, and my back scratched, and other things visitors might do with me.