Slitherin'

When I lived in the Wild West, I did some cool cowgirl stuff. For those of you who read my previous blog, you might remember some of my old adventures like when I rode a horse for the first time, when I tried to break Penny the horse, the spiders, getting gumbo stuck, the first time I went hunting, the peeping Tom Turkeys, and the first time I went to a rodeo. But I don't think I ever talked about my snake encounters.

The first one happened when I had lived there about three weeks. My apartment had a side yard my landlords id a crappy job of maintaining. The grass was about knee high most all summer long. One day when I was walking to town, all three blocks away, I decided to cut across the lawn; I don't know why. I tripped over what I thought was a big, old tree branch... until it MOVED!! I went screaming across the lawn and didn't stop running and screaming until I hit the grocery store. I was shaking and bawling my head off and I was all sweaty ans snot streaming down my face. When I could finally hurl out the words, a local guy drove to the house and shortly came back. I "tripped" over a bull snake that was about 6 feet long. I think I fainted. The upside is that bull snakes don't hurt people; they eat rattle snakes. The other upside is, apparently, that on my way across the yard I missed seeing the huge coiled rattle snake that was on my patio. Oh. My. Goddess. The guy who went to see what I tripped on also killed the rattler.

My second rattlesnake encounter was when I was with another teacher. I was riding with her to her ranch when we came to a rattler stretched all the way across the road. Without missing a beat, she kept on talking but stopped her truck, ran over it, and backed up and down over it a few more times. then whipped out a pistol and shot the sucker dead. I think my heart stopped beating for a week. And she rendered me speechless.

My third encounter was, by far, the best and I didn't look like such a fool. Well, not until the end. In the spring of my first year, I went to help move cattle from winter to summer pastures. We all had horses saddled up with shot guns strapped to them, as well as a rope and gloves and a saddle bag. All the horses looked the same as far as equipment went; I don't think anyone intended for me to use a gun. It was just "there.". Now, I had learned to shoot earlier that fall so while I wasn't super comfortable with a gun, I knew the basic workings.

So all of us are spread all over, moving the cows (it's easier to herd cattle than kids because I've done both and can speak with authority). We all sort of had out own section of pasture to cover. I was doing my thing when I looked down and saw I was stopped about 6 feet from a HUGE rattlesnake. It was coiled and sunning itself on some rocks. It was shaking its rattle and looking at me.

Without thinking lots, I whipped out the shot gun, took aim, pulled the trigger and I actually killed the snake in a single shot. One shot. Then I rode away, got my straggling calf and headed toward the others.

That's when I saw the others. All 15 people lined up, halted in mid motion, staring at me, mouths agape. I rode over and said, "what?" Everyone started talking at once, cheering me, patting me. They said I looked like Annie Oakley out there, never missing a beat, sitting on the horse, hat pushed back... And how cool it was that the snake was in striking distance of me and the horse and I never flinched. Striking distance?!? Oh. My. God. That's when I started shaking and crying. The owner of the cows said he was just glad I didn't shoot the stray calf, which is what he thought I was doing. Hey, I was surprised as the next guy that I killed it, didn't shoot myself or a cow.

And those are my Wild West snake stories. In the immortal words of Indiana Jones, "Snakes? Why does it always have to be snakes?!?"

These snakes weren't on a plane...

I had a dream the other night. And it makes me wonder what in the world is going on in my subconscious.

In my dream, I'm asleep in my bed, in my attic room at Daddy-O's house and in my dream I feel something slither across me, on top of the covers. And not slither in a sexy way.

So in my dream, I wake up and jump out of bed. I'm standing next to the bed and there are HUGE snakes on the floor, looking like about 20 of them but probably just 2 but they are enormous and fat and just HUGE. These huge snakes are crawling and slithering around my legs. I stand motionless, listening to them slither and hiss at me and bare their fangs. I'm paralyzed with fear, with my heart pounding, face red, beads of sweat running down me, labored breathing, scared out of my mind. Then they slide under the bed and i jump on top of my bed. They sudden appear again, popping their heads over the side and I throw my white goose down duvet on top of them and I grab a garden hoe, that is for some bizarre reason (that can only happen in a dream of course) conveniently leaning against the bedroom wall, and hack them to death while they are trapped under the blanket.

When I'm done I hear Mac and his friend Ryan laughing (in Real life, in non dream life, that is- I have never even met Ryan but Mac tells me horrendous stories about the shit this kid does and it makes me, in the real awake world, cringe that Mac chills out occasionally with this kid). I guess Ryan had caught the snakes and they deiced to mess with me and set them loose. I called the police and had both boys arrested.

The cops came and took the boys and I was sitting there waiting for animal control to come and take the snake remains when the duvet started twitching.

Then I woke up. I woke from this dream at 4:51 am and have been awake since then.

Agreein' with Indiana Jones,
Mags