It
was a standard sawed-off family return trip from south Florida; i.e. split the
distance home by spending the night at the Black Lagoon lodge.
Upon
arrival we spotted a lobby sign about a gathering the next morning of the FSU
psychobiology graduate program (from which I had emanated long ago). “Now my
wife she says” (Kicliter) you should go there and see them. I thought maybe
yes, maybe no as they had business to discuss and we had to make it back home
that day. So I slept on the possibility/opportunity which had the attraction of
sort of dropping out of the sky with no early warning, a favorite sawed-off
tactic.
As
was also standard practice, the next early AM, shavings and I headed off to St.
Marks to see what was happening after a gas station breakfast (= powdered sugar
donuts, cokes, slim Jims, whatever ≡ bribes to go along on the adventure). What
was happening was a small cottonmouth was dead on the road but in pretty good
shape after a few chiropractic adjustments. This was an opportunity to take a
nice picture of said, dead, cottonmouth sitting at the base of a cypress tree.
As the most readily available cypress tree base was in the Black lagoon’s
swimming area I put the model in the empty powdered sugar donut box.
Upon
return to the lagoon I went down to the swimming area, positioned the small
cottonmouth at the base of a cypress tree, and took a few pictures. It was
still too early for this…..activity…. to ‘interest’ the general public (pity)
but I thought it unwise to leave the snake, dead or not, where he was
positioned. So I put him back in the donut box and the box in my pocket as I
planned on a toss-out-the-window burial
up the road.
We
breakfasted again in the elegant Black Lagoon lodge dining room (table cloths,
china, silverware) by which time Mrs. Sawed-off had prevailed upon me to swing
by the psychobiology gathering.
When
I walked into the room someone I didn’t know was arranging papers into piles.
As I explained my presence from behind comes “Well, as I live and breathe
(Berkley), “Look what the cat dragged in” (Smith). I turned and greeted old
committee members/friends.
Among
them was Glayde Whitney, a behavioral geneticists/sensory systems, who had
arrived at FSU a few years before my departure. We exchange generalities then
Glayde
says “My son is into snakes too.”
ML:
Well good, what’s he got?”
Glayde
rattles off a list and then tosses in
GW:
“Yea he’s really into snakes.”
ML:
~ back to “That’s great.”
GW:
(crossing a line I was prepared to defend) “ Yea, I think he’s more into snakes
than you.”
ML:
“More than me?”
GW:
Yea, more than you”
ML:
“Glayde, let me show you something.”
taking
the donut box out of my pocket and revealing its contents.
GW:
long pause then “Ok, not more than you”
Ah
you should have been there. (and now you
are)
ML
8
May, 2014
