Snakes and Snails

It's been hotter than blazes around here. This week it got up to 100 degrees. It's so hot that the grass has stopped growing and started turning brown in spots. It's so hot that I've been putting out lots of water for the dogs and cats and filling the birdbath every day. I even put a dish of water out for the little critters that creep around on the ground. I got that idea from Scout. He has a little dish sitting on the ground with water for the frog that lives under his porch.


So many critters are suffering from the heat. It only stands to reason that they will turn up wherever they can find water. Scout and Kim have a swimming pool in the backyard. This king snake probably smelled the water or was searching for food in the surrounding undergrowth.

My boy Scout likes to be a snake wrangler. Okefenokee Joe (http://www.okefenokeejoe.com/) came to Dug Gap School and gave a demonstration about snakes when he was in kindergarten. Scout has been charmed ever since.


Scout probably got his love of snakes from my grandfather. He was notorious for not killing snakes. Grampa thought everything was good and he didn't eliminate snakes in his philosophy. Grampa had a pet little snake that lived in a rock wall in his yard. Momma saw it one time and tried to kill it but Grampa stepped in and told her not to hurt his little snake. He said he had burned some brush near the wall and he thought he had blinded the snake. He felt sorry for it and would feed it grubs and insects when he saw it. He said it was his friend.

My grandparents moved from town to Crow Valley later. They lived there several years before a dam was built near them. Grampa's property was below the spillway. Grampa and Gramma loved fishing at the bottom of the dam. Grampa also liked fishing in the lake. 


Grampa said he went to the top of the dam to go fishing one day and saw a stringer at the edge of the water. Someone had left their stringer of fish in the water. A snake had tried to swallow a fish on the line and the fish was stuck in it's throat. Grampa picked up the snake and the fish and tried to work the fish out of the snakes mouth. He said he worked slow so as not to hurt the snake until he was able to get the fish dislodged from the snakes mouth. 


He put the snake back in the water until it got it's strength back. It finally swam away from the bank, away from him. He said the funniest thing happened. The snake turned around and swam nearly up to him and swam in place with it's head sticking out of the water. It just looked at him. It began to swim away again and got a little farther but stopped and turned around and swam back to the bank where Grampa was standing. It swam in place with it's head raised above the water looking him in the eye again. It swam away again but stopped, again and swam back to him one more time to look at him. It finally turned around and swam away.


Grampa said he thought the little snake came back to thank him for saving his life. He was so proud of saving the snake's life. 


Momma laughed and said she bet the snake wasn't thanking him for saving his life. She bet the snake was sizing him up and wondering if he could swallow Grampa.


We all had a good laugh over that but I think Grampa was right. The snake understood that Grampa saved his life and wanted to thank him. Animals may not think like we do but they do understand more than we give them credit for.


God put everything here for a purpose and that day Grampa's purpose was to save that snake's life. That's kind of cool if you think about it. 

AS ALWAYS

PIO

The Runaway Logsplitter

"Neither a borrower, nor a lender be . . . " That reminds me of the story about the logsplitter.

Don's a metal worker and he is a genius with a torch and metal. He made a great logholder for my parents when we first got married and he's able to make anything if he has the time. He has built several flatbed trailers and he even built his own logsplitter after we bought a wood stove and started burning firewood. When a couple of friends heard that Don had built a logsplitter they asked to borrow it. Don is a much more generous person than I am so he agreed to let them borrow his logsplitter. He figured it would be okay because it was a heavy duty hydraulic logsplitter built on a huge I-beam and was practically indestructible. It was capable of splitting some huge trees. He said there wasn't any way they could hurt the logsplitter so I shouldn't worry. Huh! Little did he know.

My friend Pat and her husband asked to borrow the logsplitter and Don lent it to them. Alan came to our house to get the logsplitter and even brought it home after a couple of weeks. I was in the yard when he pulled up in our driveway in his big red truck and just sat there grinning like a 'possum. He hadn't said a word yet. I said, "Hello Alan. What are you doing?" and he kept smiling and said he was returning the logsplitter.

I was confused because I could see that he didn't have the logsplitter with him. Don came outside to see what Alan was doing.When Alan realized that he didn't have the logsplitter attached to his truck he and Don went back down the road trying to find it.

They found the logsplitter a couple of miles down the road where it had come loose from the truck and ended up in a bunch of trees. Don and Alan wrestled it out of the undergrowth and hooked it back up to the trailer hitch and brought it home.

I'm sure I teased Alan mercilessly for losing the logsplitter and not even noticing it and I know I told Pat what a bonehead he was. She had always been aware of Alan's imperfections before and had told good natured stories about him so I didn't think it would make her mad. But not long after that incident I called Pat and she never returned my phone calls. I tried to talk to her several times and she never ever called again. I finally got the message and quit calling her. Oh well.

I couldn't figure out what I had done that was so awful that she wouldn't talk to me but over the years I have seen several friends fall by the wayside. It really hurt my feelings to lose a friend without understanding why. Years later Don admitted that he had told Alan off and told him what a dumbass he was when they had gone back to get the logsplitter. He was really mad at Alan for losing the logsplitter and for not even realizing it until he got to our house. Maybe that's why Pat didn't talk to me again. I just don't know.

Next it was Don's childhood friend Terry who asked to borrow the logsplitter. Don even took it over to Terry's house to let him use it. He lived up in Crow Valley in the country and he had a lot of firewood to split. Terry had one cripple arm so he had been having a hard time getting all his wood split. The logsplitter was the answer to his prayers. Don told him to keep the logsplitter as long as he needed it and he could bring it home when he had all his wood split. Don emphasized the importance of getting the logsplitter hitch locked and using the safety chains.

When Terry was through with the logsplitter he hooked it to the trailer ball and started to bring it home. He got on Walnut Avenue, one of the busiest two lane highways in Dalton, before the logsplitter suddenly came loose from the car and went barreling across both lanes of oncoming traffic and landed in the front yard of a vacant house.

Terry was so shaken that he came on down to our house and got Don to ride back up there and help him get the logsplitter. They brought the logsplitter home.

After these two incidents we didn't lend the logsplitter to anybody again. He let his stepfather use it but he took the logsplitter to Charlie's house and went back to pick it up. We didn't want to take any chances of anybody getting killed, or hurt.

Like I said, "Neither a lender, nor a borrower be." Now you know why it doesn't pay to lend things. We could have been sued if somebody had been injured when the logsplitter was being hauled around by some careless or incompetent person. Thank goodness nobody was injured in either case but the indestructible logsplitter could have been lethal.

AS ALWAYS PIO