One of a Fox | Ten Years After 6

Dear Teekje / Ticky,

I can hardly believe it, but this month marks ten years since you carried away something of the colour of the dunes with you. And although it feels like yesterday, the dunes haven’t been the same since. It’s as if you took the key to the fairytale with you. Nature is still beautiful, but the true magic is gone.

Universal sentiment

I still don’t fully understand why your disappearance hit me so deeply back then. What I do know now is that it wasn’t just my own sentiment, but something universal. When I decided to share your story, because I had to, I expected very little understanding. People already find it strange when someone grieves a lost pet, let alone a free, wild animal. But I didn’t care. Writing is how I deal with what feels too big, too strange, or too raw to comprehend. And then the unexpected happened: I had never received so many moved and heartfelt reactions to a story before. Apparently you touched something deep inside….

Fancy Fox

It wasn’t because you were particularly sweet. Or particularly beautiful (even though I thought you were). Or particularly clever. I think it was because you were… particular.
From the very beginning, you were different. Not only because your nose was – to put it mildly- unusually long and your eyes so exotically slanted. Not only because your teeth were oddly shaped, your ears remarkably upright, your coat unlike any “normal” fox coat. Not because of your fancy posture, as if pride was built into you. Not because you were the only fox who ever grew curls in the rain. Not because you made your own fox rules and started building a den in the middle of summer. Not because you chose to fall in love with a rival and live in enemy territory.

One of a Fox

You just had something that refuses to be named. A kind of je ne sais quoi. Something utterly authentic. Something that may well have been a mirror. For me, and for others.
Even after a decade, I still can’t quite describe what kind of being you were. And that is saying something, because usually I can capture almost anything in words.
But not you. You were… One of a Fox!

Original story: About the Life of a Wild Red Fox Named Ticky