Charles was sleeping on a tree when I found him but when he awoke he was in his very own palace---a shoebox palace.  I snuck into my mom's room and gathered some of her shoeboxes and built a shoe-fort for Charles because he deserved a palace.  Charles liked to eat fruit. Stale fruit. Actually it was stale, frozen fruit, but he liked it.  Charles was furry, and he liked to be pet like a good pet.  I know Charles landed for a nap on the tree in front of my house because he wanted to be my  pet.  One afternoon when I was petting Charles while he was sleeping my mom barged into my room and asked if I had seen her shoeboxes. Then she looked at Charles' shoebox bat mansion and asked what I was doing with her shoeboxes. I told her that I built a mansion for my Charles. She asked who Charles was. I said Charles is my new bat. "Whhhhhhhhaaaaaat?" "You have a bat in there? Take him outside this instant!" "But he's sleeping," I retorted. "Take it outside NOW!" Well I had to let Charles go. I took him outside and opened-up the lid on his palace, but Charles kept right on sleeping. So I nudged him with a stick. He awoke, looked at me one last time and flew away all erratically. I could tell that Charles was as dissapointed as I was.

One day I hope to be reuinited with Charles. Perhaps this is my calling. I'll check the bat-walks link. I know he's out there somewhere. He probably wants some more fruit.

I really like bats, except once when I was young my father caught one while we were fly fishing and it was very sad. Isn't there a story pole downtown across from hertitage park that has a bat at the top (near the fish ladder I think)? I remember really digging that and was thinking of it just recently.