#228-A SCREAM PIERCED THE AIR

In deference to those of you who hate snakes I chose non threatening snake picture for this post.    I had another one which was a picture of S. Jackson and "Snakes on a Pane" but when my 16 year old grandson saw it he started laughing.  I asked him what was so funny and he pointed to a phrase written in the picture.  It said something like, "I hate' f-in' snakes.   I guess I had better look closer at what I choose for art from now on.

Over the years I have had a few encounters with snakes.  Unlike most women I don't run screaming for the nearest man to save me from the slithery serpents.  (No, I walk up to the nearest man to ask them what kind of snake it is.  See Snakes 1 #209 and Snakes 2 #220 if you want to see their less than manly reactions).  

I happen to like snakes.  Well, maybe like does not describe my feelings toward snakes, it is just that I don't dislike them.  In fact I find them very fascinating creatures.


This incident happened when I was teaching at a newly opened residential school for behavior disordered youths.  Students ranging from ages 14 to 16 were in my classroom all day and I taught every subject with mostly spit, air, and duct tape for materials.   Therefore, for science we went on a critter hunt on the school grounds.  The grounds were on about 10 acres and there was a small pond.  Luckily for me there were lots of frogs and FROG EGGS.  We gathered up numerous eggs and put them in an aquarium I had fixed made out of old door transoms I found in an attic of the school.  With a large pan of water in the center and landscaping around the edge it looked like a small pond.


A funny thing happened on this hunt.  One of my students yelled out, "Look, a two headed frog!"  All the other students came running, as did I.  Who wouldn't want to see a two headed frog.  As it turned out, it was my first class on sex education.  You see, the male frogs were smaller than the females and there was one tenacious little guy hanging on Ms. Frogy's back for dear life.  That day, they learned a lot I hadn't planned on.


Each day we watched the eggs develop into tadpoles.  One day I unlocked the classroom door in the morning to find the entire floor moving.  Over the weekend the tadpoles had developed enough to hop out of the aquarium and onto the floor.  When the students arrived they had a jolly good time with what was eventually called the "Great Frog Roundup" (somewhat like the frog round-up in Cannery Row.  If you haven't read it or seen it you have missed a classic).  There were frogs hopping all over the school section for days.  A few we got to kinda dissect after they were stepped on.  We learned a lot about frogs (and this was without a computer or a science book in the classroom). 

Ok, you are probably thinking, "I thought this story was about snakes."  Hold your horses there kiddo, I'm getting around to that.  The above little excerpt is a kind of foreshadow of things to come.


Later on, long after the frog fiasco, we went out to look for other critters.  This time we ran into a few snakes.  We found two small black snakes, a stub nose and three garter snakes.  We named them all (the stub nose was our favorite and we called him Charlie).  I also learned a lot from the frog lesson and made a lid for the terrarium we re-landscaped.  The students were allowed to handle the snakes and thanks to the town library we were able to get books about them.


Charlie was a neat snake.  He loved to be handled and would bend his head over until he formed a hook and would hang from your finger.  Then we would stroke him and he would quiver with delight.


Now, you have to know where this is going.  But, I will tell you anyway.  One evening the lid was left off the terrarium (who would have thunk it) and I forgot to check before I left.  The next morning I went in my classroom and started my usual routine when I noticed the terrarium was empty.  I gasped in horror as I had to jump a lot of hoops to be allowed to have the snakes after the frog debacle.  Quickly I scoured every nook and cranny of the room.  The door opened and in walked my students.  In a whisper I informed them of the problem and we devised a scheme to covertly check the other rooms in the school.  The students spread out and told anyone they encountered that they were on a scavenger hunt (and it was not shared that the only thing on that list was... snakes).



Within ten minutes of school starting a scream pierced the air.  All ten of my students converged upon the the room from which the shriek came.   When we entered the classroom the teacher was on her chair pointing to a snake that was slinking along the baseboard.  One of the students grabbed Butch and we all scurried out of the room (after swearing her to secrecy).  It didn't take long before another teacher came scurrying out of her room.  Like Ghost Busters we intervened before she could blow the whistle and Harry was captured.  We found every snake but Charlie.  The kids and I were really bummed out.


Then the weirdest thing happened.  I flopped down on a bean bag and said to the kids, "Too bad he's a snake.  If he were a dog I could just call him. Here Charlie, here Charlie."  Then one of the kids squealed and pointed, "Look."  Out from the side of a bookshelf wiggled Charlie and he headed right for us.  I scooped him up and we all gave him a welcome home stroke.  To this day I believe that Charlie came because I called him... ... ... Ok, you believe what you want...... and I will believe what I want!


By the way I taught for 4 months like that until our books finally arrived.  I called this my period of Socratic teaching.  At first I was scared to death, but it turned out to be the most fun I have ever had as a teacher.   And, all of the snakes were released back into their original environment before it got too cold for them to find a place to sleep for the winter.  

PREVIEWS OF MONDAY'S TO COME:

#229-AND THEY THOUGHT THEY WERE GOING TO GET LUCKY

kt 2/15/12

#220 - SO, I MADE A LITTLE PIT STOP!

BACK IN SEPTEMBER I PROMISED MORE SNAKE STORIES

 SO HERE IS THE NEXT INSTALLMENT

"You would have thought she learned a lesson from her experience in 1968.  

But apparently, with the passage of time,

 her brain does not process old lessons into useable knowledge. If you didn't

read that post, here is the link.  Just click on it."

http://outofmymindbykt.blogspot.com/ 

(but if she screwed up the link just go to her blog archives and to #209 on 9/19)

I was living in Missouri, again, after moving my children and myself from California.  I had been divorced for about 7 years and had purchased my first house.  I was so proud of myself and so proud of my new property.  The house sat on 3 1/2 acres of land in a small rural town of about 6,000 people.  The house had once been a farm house which was built back in the early 40s.  It was sturdy, well built, had two bedrooms, a very large front room, dining room, kitchen and bathroom.


One Saturday morning in 1977 I was out front doing yard work.  There was a lot of that kind of work to be done on my new place, but I was joyfully mowing, cutting, trimming and in general doing a bang up job preening my new home.


Plopping down in front of a crepe myrtle (a beautiful plant by the way) I started to pull weeds and trim around the base of one of the myrtles.  Out darted this cute little snake about 6 inches long and about as big around as my pinkie.  I quickly slapped my ungloved hand down and caught it by the back of the neck.  At the time I was thinking, that my son, Gene, would probably like to have a pet snake (de' ja vous).


Fortunately, (not necessarily for them) there were some men across the street in my neighbor's back yard.  They were digging a pit in which to fashion a storm shelter.


I walked across the street and into the yard with my newly acquired friend dangling from the thumb and forefinger of my right hand.  I stepped up to the edge of the hole (which was about 6 x 6 x 6) held my hand out over the pit (great choice of words, right?) and asked, "Do any of you guys know what kind of snake this is?" (Nope, as my friend said at the beginning of this post, I didn't learn a thing from before).

Other than at a sporting event, have you ever seen men jump six feet into the air, up and over an obstacle?  Well, I had the pleasure of seeing 2 men levitate almost straight up and out of that hole in a split second.  This not being the big city, but being a town with a church on almost every corner, they weren't shouting obscenities.   It went more this, "Dang lady!"  "Woah there, girl!"   "For heaven's sakes, woman!"

Yes, you guessed it.  I had found another Copperhead.  Only, this time it was a baby.  Yes, it had a beautiful pattern but it was more black and grey and did not have the bright copper color as yet.  But, I was puzzled by their reaction to this cute little guy/gal until one of them calmed down enough to tell me that the little guys were almost as venomous as the big ones.

"Are you reading this, Sisssssy?
Can you believe that she has gone and done it...
 AGAIN?"

At that point I became concerned.  Here, I had it by it's neck.  I didn't want it back in my yard because of my children and pets.  In fact, I didn't want to turn it loose at all.  That is when my neighbor suggested that I just go into the street, drop it and run.  He would then chop it into pieces with his shovel.  So, that is what we did.  I dropped the sucker and ran.  He chopped away and dispatched it post haste.

My neighbor stood there for a minute and staired at me (by that time I was up on my porch).  He smiled, shook his head, turned, and headed back to his yard.  For months, when ever he saw me he would smile and shake his head.


And this is not then end of my snake stories.  I have at least two more coming up in the next month or so.
See if you can pick them by the coming attractions I will end each post with.

NEXT MONDAY WATCH FOR:

#221-PETS LEAVE THE STRANGEST GIFTS  #222-THE PARTY PLANNER #223-SLOSHED! kt 8/11

#209 - BOARD to DEATH (just read it before you criticize my spelling).

My first real encounter with a live snake
(which I shall reveal here) was a DOOZIE 
and occurred around the first of August in 1968

Though not a professional snake wrangler, I have handled snakes (itty bitty garden snakes) before.  After all, I was once a Girl Scout and a den mother for a group of 8 cub scouts.  I had been shown (several times) how to correctly handle snakes and how to tell if they were venomous.  Also, come on, over the years I have watched dozens of shows by Mutual of Omaha and the Animal Channel. 


At the time of this encounter I was living in a small farm home in the Missouri Ozarks.  My husband (soon to be ex, but that's another story) had moved us there from Palm Desert, California.  I loved the Ozarks area and the house was the home in which my husband was born, so it had meaning.

Out behind the house was a small barn and in the pasture were three horses.  One was a big, white, frightening, wild eyed, stallion.  One was a mean little Shetland runt (who loved to nip my thigh and rump).  And, one (which was ours) was a retired, circus horse who knew all kinds of tricks (if you knew how to prompt her).   Ginger was 26 years old and as smart as a whip.  She didn't like to be ridden so she would always detour under low hanging branches and close to the trunks of trees.  I got knocked/scraped off several times (but she never did that with my kids). 

Ginger, Gene, Patty and me (can't believe I had my hair up in curlers)

The horses would not go into the barn no matter what I did.  I tried leading them, luring them, cooing to them and on and on and on.  Finally, I decided it was because there were boards just laid down on the dirt floor.  When I walked on them they would wobble a bit so I can imagine how they would move when the horses stepped on them.  Plus, there was other junk stored in that barn.

So, one day, since it was getting close to fall I decided the barn needed to be cleaned out for the horses.
In I went with a rake, a shovel, a wheelbarrow, a broom and a bucket with various items in it.  I hauled all of the junk out and stacked it behind the barn to be carried off or burned.  I worked on this all morning and into the afternoon while a friend watched my kids.  Then it came time to pull out the boards.  Everything was going fine until I got to the 5th board.  As I lifted it up a hugh (and I do mean HUGH) snake darted out then back under the next board.

I had only seen the animal for a brief second but long enough to consider it one of the most beautiful snakes I have ever seen.   This snake had orange, light-brown,  even a pinkish body that was highlighted by darker chestnut brown bands that formed a whole series of hourglass shapes across its body.

See, isn't it beautiful!

Immediately I thought of my son Gene.  He would love a snake as a pet. Therefore, I set about devising a way to catch it.

I glanced around and quickly came up with a plan which involved the bucket, a broom and a small piece of wood for a lid to the bucket.  Armed with this snake snaring paraphernalia I proceeded to raise and toss the 6th board.  The snake tried to pull the same maneuver and slip under board #7.  But, ha..ha..I was too quick for him/her.  After flinging the plank I grabbed the bucket and broom.  Then I beat the tarnation out of the snake with the broom and steered him into the bucket.  Whack, whack, whack, turned up the bucket, then slapped the make shift lid on the top.  Now, I could have reached down and grabbed it by the neck at the back of it's head, but since I hadn't gotten a real good look at it I decided not to take the chance.

Satisfied with my smart move and my prize I picket up the bucket, put it in the back seat of my car (with a rock on the lid) and headed for my father-in-laws country store, just down the road.  I wanted to know just what kind of snake I had caught (this was the olden days before internet).

When I arrived several men from the area had congregated around the inside of the store.  As usual they were drinking beer, sharing stories, and laughing.  I came in the door and they greeted me with a few nods and a "Hey, gal."

I put my bucket down, removed the lid tilted it towards the men and said, "Do any of you guys know what kind of snake this is?"  Before I could finish my sentence ALL of the men jumped up falling all over each other and fled the store.  Some were running, (one jumped through the open screen-less window),  all were cussing and yelling all sorts of unpleasant comments.  I put the lid back on the bucket and looked out the door.

My husband yelled from the parking lot,  "Karen, you've done a lot of hair-brained things but this one takes the cake."  Get that darned bucket out here (only he didn't exactly say darned)."

When I returned to the door with the bucket in hand I could see all of the men lined up with shotguns in their arms.  Now, this was the Ozarks, my friends, and since my husband and I hadn't been getting along lately I thought that this might be what is referred to as a QUICKY DIVORCE, Ozark style.

My husband asked me to gently put the bucket down in front of the men, and back up.  Ok, like a good wife, I did what I was told and then there was a deafening sound as all seven men fired at the bucket.  The bucket was blown to smithereens as was that beautiful snake.  DEATH was brutal and swift.

In not too kind of a tone or gentle language (and with one hand on his hip and the other hand pointing a finger at me), my husband told me that I had managed to capture an unusually large Copperhead whose venom could have killed me before anyone could have gotten me to the hospital.  He went on to add that this was the blind season for Copperheads making it an extremely dangerous time to mess with them. 

What did I say in response?"Oh, and it was so pretty."  To which my husband threw up his hands and stomped off.

I tried like crazy to find a yellow smiley face snake.  This will have to do.
By the way, do you NOW get my little pun of a title? 
 (Ok, ok, a little cheesy but it is all I could come up with)    kt 8/2011

PS:  WOULD YOU BELIEVE THAT 43 YEARS TO THE MONTH I CAUGHT A YOUNG COPPERHEAD!  On September 8th I was leaving the hospital after visiting my dad and a kid ran to the nurses station and said, "There's a snake in the waiting room.  My dad thinks it's a copper head."  Without missing a beat I said, "I'll take care of it."

When I got there a young snake about 12 inches long was laying up against the base board under a chair.  Four other people were standing about six feet from the critter.  Although small, I knew immediately that it was a young Copperhead.  A young woman entered the room with a broom and a bucket.  I started to laugh as I remembered the above story.  I just told her to stay where she was.  I took a trash can, tipped it over, stepped on the very end of the snakes tail and it quickly slithered into the dark bucket.  I tipped the bucket up and then tied a knot in the plastic baggie.  Handing the trash can with baggie and snake to the girl with the broom I said, "There you go."

The next morning when I returned to see Dad I asked his nurse if she had heard about the snake in the waiting room.  She said yes, and then I asked her what she had heard.  Her words exactly were, "I heard that there was a Copperhead snake in the waiting room and some crazy lady caught it and gave it to an aide."  Then her eyes got big and she said, "Were you that crazy lady?" All I could do was laugh.