Critters Without Shoulders

I apologize to those of you who may have experienced a hearing loss a few days ago. A long black snake decided to visit me, on my patio. My reaction left my husband, who had the misfortune to be sitting next to me, with ringing in both ears and the snake now needs a hearing aid!

I’ve heard, there are good snakes and bad snakes. I conclude there must be definitions of the word “good” that I don’t understand.

When I was in the 3rd grade in Savannah, a friend of mine usually walked to school with me. Our walk was beautiful because we travelled through several of the famous squares in the historic district of that old town. But for some reason, that day we didn’t take that picturesque walk together. My friend told me later, he was distracted by something moving on the ground. He stopped on his way, picked up a small snake, put it in his lunch box and went to class. He must have bragged to a friend, that he had a snake in his lunchbox because, before recess, someone let it out of the lunchbox and into the classroom. Everyone was standing on the desks and screaming. But despite the efforts of the teacher to prevent a disaster, a little girl was bitten and rushed to the hospital. The doctors finally amputated part of her leg. You see, it was a little rattlesnake that caught the attention of my friend that day!

Years later (about 1965) when I was in a science class at Gordon High School, our teacher invited another science teacher to help with a classroom activity. On occasion, that visiting teacher, kept live snakes in cages in the classroom. I had the good fortune to walk by one day when they were feeding baby chicks to the scary creatures (in case you didn’t recognize it, the phrase “good fortune” is sarcasm).

My teacher explained that a rather large non-poisonous snake was going to be passed around our class. We were assured that we did not have to participate. I felt my heart pounding in my throat! But my 90-pound-macho ego wouldn’t let me decline the activity if just one other person in the room was going to hold that darn snake. The young man who was taking the snake from each person and handing it to the next one, laughed out loud as he came to my desk. I’m still not sure why he was so amused! I asked him if the snake he was about to hand over to me, was known to bite. He replied that some snakes bite. Was that a YES?

The snake was about 4 feet long and thick enough that I couldn’t touch my fingers together around his body. He (I refer to the snake as “he” because I don’t really know the gender and don’t care) was coiled on one of my hands and I was holding his body/torso/neck just below his head with the other hand. The snake kept his head so close to my face that I could feel his tongue on my nose. No matter how far I tried to move his head away, his face never left my face. The snake handler leaned down and with a grin, explained that the snake was using his tongue to smell. REALLY! I needed help not a science lesson!!!!!

And then the snake handler said a most profound thing. “Don’t let the snake know you’re afraid!” Too late! I had already nervously shaken so hard that the snake and I were both worn slap out. No time to recover, the snapping baby alligator was next!

I really don’t like snakes.