On my way back home this morning, I found this little guy enjoying his Sun bath.....

Because the image isn't particularly high resolution, allow me to first describe what I saw back there, right before he zapped me: A ball of stone, about 90 centimeters across, topped by a metal topping, which had apparently dripped down from the hollow metal sphere with the cloudlike holes in it. Inside is a stown owl, that has lived there for as long as I can remember, and I came to live near it in 1988.

But as I looked on, something happened: he zapped my mind with a story, so intriguing I just had to take his picture, and introduce him to you: 

This is where he lives, an image I gleamed from Google maps. Just to the right of this is his metal prison, where he no doubt was looking at the author of this photograph, and me, as we clicked away in Warnsveld, the Netherlands. I'd already had the idea before, that despite his prison, this owl knew EXACTLY how the Cosmos operates. And his story fused with my mind just now confirmed my suspicion:

Hi there, you writer guy!

Hello, I'm over here. Get that phone out of your pocket like you did a few years ago, and get me on the cover of Moorelife! I've got a story to tell....

Yeah, I watched you arrive here. Maybe not the exact day you came to town, but the very day you cycled past my doorstep. You described me already from your viewpoint a few years ago, but this time it's my turn.

I live here, and behold the world outside, ever since my creator had me placed here no doubt after an incentive from someone higher up. You called it a prison just now, I call it home. It is roomy enough for a solitary animal like myself. Might be a little crowded for your 6 foot 6 solitary nature, but then again it's my home. Yours is elsewhere, and undoubtedly just as roomy. I only know the home of my creator, and this, and both are adequately prepared for existence, enjoyment even.

My creator looks in on me every now and then. Just last year he must have been by when I wasn't watching, because all of a sudden the bramble bushes that surrounded me were magically removed by guys with various tools, so my view outside improved dramatically. Weeks later new bushes were planted, but now at least they have given me some breathing space by adding purple flowering bushes around my base, which aren't as invading as those brambles.

I watch outside, and I see you guys are just like me: You have a bit more freedom, because you are in cages that can move, but you're still in cages. Some of you, like your fortunate being, have moving contraptions that don't restrict you. Others are totally free, but still I see them trapped in this cyclical pattern of daily repetitions and season's undulations. Yes, I know blistering sunshine like today, or butt-freezing snow that fills up my home. Since the roof is open, I cannot help that. Fortunately, I do not have a problem with wind, like my friends the trees. Being stone and metal, I'm too heavy to really be affected by something so trivial....

See you around kid, you're alright!