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One of the most entertaining for me to write about were the skunks. They are not wild skunks.
Did you know skunks are native to North America—considered the sacred animal of the Hopi, right along with the Eagle? If you love stories about animals, well, there are also two Newfoundland dogs who are adopted from a rescue, Garth and Susanna. Then add a mischievous gray seal that comes from who knows where. And an infamous woodchuck prowling Lindsay both day and night. A Breath Floats By is the story of a soul cluster of women and men, brought together to support one another in their present life and fulfill their life purpose. A story of life and of dying. Inspiration, spirit, wisdom. Miracles and sacrifice. Life itself.
"Does she ever quit with the camera?" "No. Just keep eating." Meet Sequoia and Jeronimo. The two skunks featured in Skunk Medicine: There's A Skunk in the House! and Other Tail-raising Stories. Read more at the Pet Skunk Medicine Blog. Excerpt from
The Twilight Daniel and Lindsay spend the night, Gooee arrives, and soon the skunks are meeting Gooee...… Chapter Three—two of the pet skunks, Itty and Fern, meet Gooee for the first time……. “You ready for bed?” Daniel asked as his hand poised over the light switch. Shocked at the question, knowing better all the same, Lindsay nodded and avoided looking at him. She simply said, “Good night.” Her back felt stiff because her willful body wanted to go the other way as she passed through the shortest hall in the world to the living room. Three steps seemed like thirty. “See you in the morning,” he called from the back of the kitchen. He had to turn past the refrigerator in the cubbyhole, and she heard him climb the steep, narrow carpeted stairs. They made it to separate bedrooms, she thought gratefully. So far so good. No no, never use Gooee’s expression. Lindsay heard the weight of his steps on the thick carpeted floor above the living room. He entered the large office-library-guest room where she had made up a decent-sized brown metal antique bed with feather top mattress along the windows. She imagined him on the white goose down comforter taking off his shoes, sliding around a little bit, deciding it was all too puffy to suit him. She went in her room and closed the door, raising the layers of sheers to cascade over the glass panes tonight. Itty toddled toward Lindsay, raised her tail, scooted her front feet backward, compacted herself into a square shape, and gave a sharp little stomp before she ran beneath her skirt, her tail tickling bare shins. “There you are,” she cooed, snuggling the petite round skunk. “My Itty bitty pretty one, smelling sweet as a powder puff. My soft sweetheart.” Fern came skidding around the bed. She nearly tipped onto her nose as she screeched to a halt and wheeled around, acting like she would spray. “Fluffy Fern, I’m going to pinch your butt.” She snuggled Itty and tousled Fern with a thick slipper on her foot for something besides toes to grab. Run away, stomp, skid back, stomp, wheel and pretend to spray. Fern, named for her proud tail, was three years old and not tired of playing yet. “Hey, Lindsay…” Daniel’s voice trailed eerily through the air vent in her ceiling. She looked up. “What?” “Pinch them for me too,” he said, and she realized he heard every move she made. “Are you in Sam’s room?” Sam’s was right over hers for a north lake view. “No, but I can still hear you.” “Goodness, thanks for letting me know. Night then, Daniel…” and he called softly back, “Good night, Lindsay.” Quietly she put on her nightdress then whispered her prayer for no dreams just as she had since high school, and slid between the warm jersey sheets into the promise of white calm that held her mind safe. A vision in light came before she slept. A vision of an old man with long hair pulled back, a fathomless spirit that spun into a younger man with blonde hair pulled back. A man with olive eyes. No, an owl. But she was calm and safe. * * * * * A squeal like a teapot going off in the dawn sat her straight up for a second. Then she dropped back to her pillow and rolled on the bed toward the skunks in their wee bedroom corner by the windows. If one wanted to live with skunks, she thought, they must be willing to get up at four twenty-four every morning. That was precisely when her skunks decided to go to bed and began quibbling over which den they would sleep in. Fern was screaming in wrath today. Itty was on her side next to Fern, back against the wall, pushing with all her legs to get Fern off the white flannel sheets. But it was Fern’s bed. Itty’s was the plush den closest to the sweet alfalfa-filled litter box for a reason.
She wasn’t supposed to dream if she prayed, so what was going on? (Though Itty had been dreaming of corn on the cob) she munched seeds with tail high then followed Lindsay for more. Instead Lindsay made coffee, dumped lentils in a crockpot for soup, checked the dogs, started dishes, clothes. She needed breakfast, and the dogs and skunks needed fed... Oh goodness, wake up brain, Daniel was here too. “Woo-hoo,” a woman’s voice called cheerily from the mudroom door. No, oh no no no! Gooee. All-encompassing, abominable Gooee. Lindsay backed toward the cubbyhole door, wanting terribly to flee. She could hide behind Maimee’s cottage until Gooee decided she was not here. How did Gooee know she was here? Lindsay had purposefully not spoken to her for fourteen months. The woman truly was just too out there. Just too- too- universal-minded. Lindsay was here and now. Earth unbound. Gooee was always projecting her thoughts into Lindsay’s brain and goodness knows how she managed that, but it worked for her. Lindsay wanted her privacy and life to be normal. “Woo-hoo. Didn’t someone need beautiful white ironstone china from England?” This cannot be happening. Lindsay, uncombed and in her robe, cautiously rounded the corner to face a fresh vision of brown-eyed Gooee in red lip gloss. The shawl and long, red batik dress spoke her entitlement in the world, and though the undesired guest only opened the door, not the screen, Lindsay felt intruded upon……………….. …………..Gooee turned from the kitchen to the living room, depositing the plastic bowl on the table without looking, instead her entranced gaze on the cottage. “This is nice. Oh, oh, so nice. I like it. I really like it.” She wandered around the living room like she could buy the place herself. “Oh, but I should be quieter. Sam must be sleeping.” She pointed at the bedroom through the French doors. “Is that your master bedroom?” she whispered. The doors were open. Empty bed unmade. Itty and Fern were staring them down, standing on the rug belligerently pointing their tails at the ceiling that hid Daniel. “A face off with skunks,” Gooee said. “Universal moment.” She tilted her pretty gray head to the far left, studying them. “They’re very square, aren’t they?” “When they’re planning to stomp and spray you,” Lindsay said.
Novel: pet skunks book, book on skunks, skunks as pets, skunks domestic, skunkie delight, skunk care, skunk story, skunk images, skunk pics, skink photos, exotic pets, wild skunk, woodchuck, groundhog, seal, Newfoundland, animal medicine, shaman, Native American belief, Hopi, The Book of the Hopi, fiction
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Oh yes, THREE PET SKUNKS ! ! ! They light up this novel….. a fun read, especially when they are on guard! 
Since you are here, you must really love skunks, so I will just use the biggest scene I have with the skunks, a really long one. You will meet Daniel and Gooee too, along with Lindsay, our main character.
Lindsay grabbed Itty and went to the mudroom to let Garth and Susanna outside. In the kitchen she shook a dozen hulled sunflower seeds out of a canning jar for Itty. “You’re being a witch this morning. You do know Great-horned owls eat skunks?” And Lindsay remembered the owl from her sleep, though an owl of a different kind. 
