A September Story in February

He said so long and he was gone,
his visit it was short,
but should he come around again,
I hope it's to our port! P.

We had a most delightful visitor this week. I looked out the kitchen window and spied him with my own little eyes in his handsome dark green suit. His yellow spots behind his head set off the slender neck and accented his inquisitive black eyes. He arrived at the pond on Tuesday and appeared to be having a delightful time, at least I thought he was. Looking back on it now, he may have been making frantic attempts to escape instead of diving and covering the width of the pond in seconds out of pure joy. Perhaps the arms extended out of the water towards the kitchen window were pleas for help instead of friendly waves!!! When it comes to turtle talk I was way behind my class, getting very low grades indeed.

Funny thing about turtles. They never say much. Don't complain or disrupt your dinner. Never ask for their favorite desserts to be delivered at any certain time. Looking back on it, all he ever did was paddle around with his neck out of the water and sun himself on the flat rock in the pond. Long about Friday I thought, the poor soggy bugger has no way OUT of that pond. The sheer drop of about 8 inches pretty much cancels any attempt he may make to exit said safe haven. Hmm! It was about this time I decided I had a Bog Turtle in my moat. I know it is! I get really excited and decide to share my joy with the Game Commission who knows about these things and rejoices when one is found, or so I had it pictured in my tiny little mind. Well folks, they have let me down again. After talking to three different departments about my new friend, including a secretary who admitted she knows nothing, she just does her job, they have a man in the Boating department, yes it's truly true, contact me. Yes, I know he will be able to help me. Sure enough he said that it isn't a Bog Turtle. They have red strawberry patches behind their heads, not yellow like my dark eyed travelers. Well then, said I, you had better rush right into your website and change the description. Some fool, maybe the secretary, says that they have yellow OR red spots. Your secretary admits to knowing nothing, but surely YOU are right. I asked how much experience he has had in identifying Bog Turtles in the field, to which he responded that there are only 35 known sites in the state which HAVE any Bog Turtles.

Friends and democrats, this is where I tend to lose patience with people in charge of things important to me. I live along the Conewago Creek in a flood plane. I pay flood insurance to live here. That's fine. It's my choice to be periodically threatened by high water rather than be surrounded by people who can see me picking my nose in my living room and have front yards filled with every toy ever made out of petroleum by products.

In front of our house in the woods you could grow rice for 4 months of the year. Why WOULDN'T a Bog Turtle set up housekeeping on my farm??? I think perhaps we have our quota of endangered species in Pa. and our Game Commission is embarrassed to admit that we aren't taking very good care of our wildlife. Surely that's it. In any case, I decided to build a stone ramp so he could get out whenever he chose to. Well, bless his little turtle heart, he chose to get out and run........yes run as fast as he could into the woods. He is gone and he never looked back. Maybe it was all the talk of soup he heard coming out of the kitchen window. Or maybe he is telling the other 35 Bog Turtles that there is a most wonderful pond where a little, height to weight challenged tea lady lives. It will probably be an end to their journey like in Watership Down! Soon I will see them coming down the road. Hand in hand, ten abreast, smiling their little turtle smiles and cheering noisily

"Hurrah for Prudence's most wonderful Tea Room!!! Come ye fellow Bog Turtles! Come and find safe haven in the little pond behind the house where good food, delicious hot tea and the best scones around are made fresh 3 days a week!"

Now you'll have to be careful when you come for tea................ Watch the road for turtles heading towards Prudence's along with all the customers!

Waiting for Snow

Another snow storm has been forecast for Monday in our neck of the woods. Living in the country, I find it so amusing watching people react to the weathermans words 'more snow on Monday'. Driving down any road, 3/4 of the vehicles are RV's with 4 wheel drive, yet the grocery stores aisles are jammed with people piling milk, bread and popcorn into their carts in case they get snowed in. They could save untold thousands of dollars on those cars if they ever thought about how ridiculous this behavior is. In south-central Pa. the longest I have been snowed in my whole life is 24 hours. The roads are always cleared and usable in 12 hours maximum, but fear of starvation runs deep in the Pa. Dutch heart. What if we couldn't get to the store? All of America is on a diet, but let it call for snow and they are all in survivor mode. It makes me laugh just thinking about it. I see women in jogging suits and men in sweats, ultimate atheletes, panicking about a dozen eggs and butter. Things they think will kill them on a sunny day. Snow cancels out cholesteral! Wouldn't it be great if all you had to do was change climates to clear up hardening of the arteries. A trip to Vermont would help unclog your heart!