This is the part where I admit two things — neither of which I’m proud of. First, it was only then, several months in, I realized I’d made a colossal blunder when trying to hang my precious high-tech feeder out of squirrels’ reach. I’d measured the recommended five feet off the ground sure enough, but failed to account for the elevation afforded by a nearby tree stump that cut that distance in half. Within 10 minutes of realizing my error, I moved the feeder to a non-stump-adjacent location. Voila! My immediate problem was solved. As of this writing, it’s been 40 days without a squirrel breach.

Second, even though I’d won the battle by accomplishing exactly what I’d set out to do, I refused to give up. I’d waged this war too long and invested too much. How could I sit back when my friend’s guava tree continued to be routinely ransacked and my co-worker’s avocados savaged and tossed to the ground with grubby-pawed abandon?

And worse yet, what if they decided to come for the single — and so far unscathed — orange tree just now starting to show pea-sized fruits in my backyard? No, I needed closure. But before I started investing in owl-shaped, light-up motion sensors (these exist) or blasting C-SPAN across my yard at all hours, I needed someone to tell me if protecting L.A. backyard fruit trees (humanely, remember?) was even possible.

And that’s how I ended up on the phone explaining my situation to Roger Baldwin, a UC Davis Cooperative Extension specialist who focuses on human-wildlife conflict resolution.

“You’ll find various chemical repellents that are marketed and sold [to combat them],” Baldwin told me. “But there’s nothing that’s ever been proven effective against tree squirrels. So I wouldn’t anticipate there being anything that you could spray to really keep them away. [And] there’s no kind of sound devices or ultrasonic devices or lights or strobes — or anything like that — that’s really been proven effective.” (He did note that some repellents might work on a short-term basis until the wily critters adapt.)

“No,” Baldwin said, “there’s nothing that’s guaranteed to work when you’ve got fruit trees, which are an abundant food source, and tree squirrels. … But, like with your bird feeder, if you had an isolated tree — meaning nothing else around for a good 10 feet and nothing overhanging it — and its lowest branches were a good five or six feet off the ground, you could put a metal ring around the trunk to keep them from being able to climb it. But basically this is almost never going to happen.”

He added that even trapping, which might be an option for those willing to consider the squirrel death penalty (in California, the eastern fox squirrel can be trapped and euthanized humanely — but not released elsewhere), would likely be only a temporary solution. “Invariably there’s someone — probably more than one person — on your block feeding squirrels,” he said. “And other squirrels will likely move in. And there’s not much you can do about that. There are too many access points.”

Sensing where things were headed, I cut to the chase. Based on Baldwin’s 16 years of experience, did I have any viable options beyond accepting that my backyard would forever be shared with whatever eastern gray fox squirrels wished to have their run of it?

“There’s probably not a lot that can be done to keep the squirrels from the fruit and the trees given the different limitations that you’ve discussed,” he said. “Yes, it’s more about realistically just learning to live with the squirrels.”

Perhaps sensing my dismay, Baldwin offered a tiny glimmer of hope.

“Sometimes, if you’ve got a very aggressive dog in your backyard — one that can chase squirrels effectively — that can sometimes help reduce problems,” he said.

We’re a dogless household, and the notion of getting a dog just to vanquish a squirrel (or three) felt wrong. (I’m sure our two cats would agree.) So I’m accepting defeat on that front and keeping my focus on the no-longer-under-attack bird feeder.

But so help me, the minute one of those hairy little heathens helps itself to the fruit of my orange tree, the phrase “dogs of war” is going to take on a whole new meaning on my backyard battlefield.

Many Americans assume that timidity — or its close cousin, shyness — is solely a negative trait. In our culture, calling an individual timid suggests that he is carrying anxiety, fear, and a lack of confidence. And while some of these associations might be accurate, we could also choose to see this attribute for its potential values. Timidity might go hand in hand with thoughtfulness, deliberateness, even a rich and full interior life.

Enter Jonathan Todd’s new middle-grade graphic novel, Timid. The bright cover on the book alludes to the potential for all these characteristics, from the bad to the good, captured in a single image. A Black tween sits behind an oversized red composition notebook with cartoon sketches splayed across its cover. He is wide-eyed, his oversized glasses poking out from behind the book. The rest of his face is almost completely obscured, as four giant sweat drops jump off his forehead. He is obviously anxious, clutching his book with two huddled arms. But what else is going on behind the surface?

Images from Jonathan Todd’s Timid.

Jonathan Todd/Graphix

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Written and drawn by a longtime cartoonist and comics educator Jonathan Todd, who has dedicated the book to “anyone who has ever felt alone,” the semi-autobiographical Timid follows the boy on the cover, 12-year-old Cecil Hall. He is a 7th grader whose family moves from Florida, where they have been living for most of his life, to Massachusetts. From the beginning, it’s clear that Cecil knows exactly who he is and who he wants to be—a future famous cartoonist. But it’s not always easy for him to express or act on his desires. It’s also obvious that others around him, in part because he is so quiet, don’t always take his preferences into account.

Cecil’s father, who grew up in a public housing project, thinks his son needs to be tougher, because it was toughness that got him through his own childhood. His sister thinks he is not showing enough pride in his Blackness, and she advises him to befriend other Black children at his new school immediately.

Cecil knows that his family members are only looking out for him, but it’s his gentle, soft-spoken mother who makes him feel most relaxed. Though their relationship is often relegated to the sidelines, the few quiet scenes showing them alone together reflect a Cecil completely at ease. His mother knows how to let him simply be himself, and she trusts he will find his way on his own terms.

Pages from Jonathan Todd’s Timid.

Jonathan Todd/Graphix

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Meanwhile, at school, Cecil struggles to adjust, particularly in finding a friend group. He is confused by the difference in social make up from his previous school to this new one. Among other changes, what he notes almost immediately is how kids at Webber Middle School are a lot less integrated. This is problematic, for example, when he has to figure out which table to join for lunch—the Black children mainly sit at their own, separate table.

Organized into 14 chapters illustrated in deliciously bright colors, Timid’s offbeat, cartoony drawing style captures the powerful emotions that drive young people’s lives. Above all else, Cecil wants to be recognized, by his peers and the adults around him, as an artist—to carve out an identity for himself based on the activity that brings him the most joy and fulfillment. Though he may, at times, have difficulty asking for what he wants in a direct manner, he takes chances in his own way. After several false starts, he strikes up a friendship with Sean, another Black student. They share a love of storytelling and Star Trek. They enter, and come in second, in a comic contest.

On the outside, Cecil may seem overwhelmingly timid, but upon closer look it’s clear he is full of bravery. Sometimes bravery just materializes in disguise.

Tahneer Oksman is a writer, teacher, and scholar specializing in memoir as well as graphic novels and comics. She lives in Brooklyn, NY.