By Grace Acosta

Have you seen the squirrel mug shots at Cuesta Park? Apparently, the park has had problems with aggressive squirrel activity - like squirrels jumping on strollers scavenging for food - and park authorities are advising people to refrain from feeding them in order to discourage more criminal behavior.

One posted notice displays a full-frontal photograph of a squirrel with its paws poised in front of its chest, looking like it is coveting your lunch.

Another sign reveals a “caught in the act,” surveillance-type photo showing a squirrel clearly foraging for food on top of a garbage can lid.

I guess the photos are there to identify the true culprits of misdeeds regarding unattended food, though I can’t imagine which other park animal one would mistake for a squirrel, or that people wouldn’t believe that squirrels are responsible unless some sort of proof were offered.

At any rate, the photos crack me up every time I pass one by.

When a squirrel crosses my path, I imagine it to be a fugitive on the run from a solemn and tenacious Tommy Lee Jones, a storyline that fits a squirrel’s jumpy behavior anyway, and makes my dog Parker the equivalent of a U.S. Marshal bloodhound when he stops at the base of a tree and gazes up toward the branches, hoping that one of the hunted is thick-headed enough to climb back down.

Mental indulgences like this occur during the summer when life suddenly gets warm and whimsical, and I don’t have to worry about the various obligations that permeate a typical school year. I don’t know if parents and kids really need the amount of summer vacation that we get, but it seems to me that we deserve these weeks off more and more each year.

School is such serious business now, full of stress and strain, often feeling like an “Alice in Wonderland” existence in which “It takes all the running you can do to stay in the same place.” But, life has to be more than a schedule, a set of rules or even a very important undertaking. At least, this is my presumption.

I am not, by nature, a light-hearted person. In fact, I believe most would argue that I should be the last to lecture anyone about whimsy because I have little direct, personal experience with it.

However, I am trying. I am inching toward frivolity like an untamed animal creeps toward a campfire, wary of the people sitting around who made it, but attracted to the light and warmth of the flames. Sometimes, I skitter in the other direction simply because somebody laughs out loud from having a good time, and that just can’t be right. But, I know I’ll be back, out of curiosity if nothing else, to see how the other half lives.

I will hallucinate squirrel tales; I will stay in the park a little while longer; I will refuse to make the bed.

Come next month, things may have to change, but it’s July now. It’s time for a little wasted time. I’ll worry about August later.

Acosta is a Los Altos resident. You can contact her at noshoesplease@sbcglobal.net.