Karen Wils photo Louie’s coffee.

ESCANABA — Louie left his coffee cup on the stump outside of his camp.

It was too hot to drink because it had just finished perking on the woodstove.

Louie thought he would take a walk out to his hunting blind while the steamy mug of brew cooled in the chilly autumn air.

So there sat the handsome gray earthenware mug, unattended, on the stump in the woods. The smell of the cooling coffee sent out warm invitations throughout the maples, pines and firs.

Louie hadn’t gone very far down the trail when a flock of friendly chickadees came by the camp. The little birds hailed the camp’s door with their timid “dee-dee-dees.”

One bird spotted the cup on the stump.

“Look, Charlie, the human left the coffee for us,” said one chickadee to the other. Two pairs of bird legs perched on the rim of the coffee cup. Their black capped heads bobbed into the mug for sips.

“Kind of weak,” remarked Chester Chickadee.

“Oh, I can fix that,” said his buddy Charlie as he flew off. A minute later Charlie was back with a couple of sunflower seeds in his beak. He tossed the seeds into the liquid blackness.

Again, the birds sampled the coffee. “Much better now,” they happily chirped.

Soon after the birds left, a red squirrel was lured to the stump by the rich coffee aroma. “Hey, alright man, that Louie left me a cup of coffee. How neighborly,” chattered Red. He dipped his whiskers into the coffee and drank.

“Kind ‘a bitter, not to worry, Louie, I kin fix it,” said Red.

He scampered off and dug up a wild hazel nut that he had buried earlier. Red returned with the nut, and he spit it into the coffee mug.

Then the squirrel drank heartily.

“Excellent, excellent,” muttered Red.

Spike the deer came bounding through the woods, scaring Red up into a tree. Spike snorted in the cool morning air. He caught a whiff of the coffee.

The deer pranced over to the stump and took a deep breath.

“Mmmm, nothing I like better than a good cup of coffee to unwind with after a busy night of browsing.”

He took a big slurp.

“This coffee is lacking something,” Spike said to himself.

The deer fetched a sprig of cedar and dropped it into the mug. Then Spike stirred the brew with his hoof and took another drink.

“Delicious,” he said as he wandered off into the pines to bed down.

Walter the woodcock landed on the edge of the coffee cup with a whistle of wings. Walter had migration on his mind on these cold mornings. He warmed his tail feathers over the steamy mug.

The round, brown bird dabbed his long bill into the coffee. “I can beef up this drab beverage,” said Walter. He flew to his favorite mudhole and plucked out a large worm with his scissor-like nose.

Walter returned to the stump and slid the wriggling worm into the coffee.

The bird tried the coffee again. “Perfect, just perfect,” Walter said.

The woodcock flew away when he heard the thud-thud of Louie’s big boots coming along the trail.

Louie was humming pleasantly as he paused by the stump to scoop up his cooled coffee cup. He took a big, long drink and said, “Ahhh, If I do say so myself, I make the best camp coffee in the world!”

The moral of the story is… coffee always tastes better when shared with others.

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Karen (Rose) Wils is a lifelong north Escanaba resident. Her folksy columns appear weekly in Lifestyles.