JOY ALONG THE WAY: THAT SNAKE ONCE AGAIN!

Give a person or a thing a little publicity and he/she/it gets pushy, puffed up with importance and threatens a take-over stance.

In this case it is a thing. More specifically it is Old Stripe, the garter snake. I have spoken of him, not lovingly but tolerantly as a part of the ecosystem around here. For a while we played a form of hide-and-seek. He hid, I sought, with hoe, stick, rocks, whatever was handy. He got the hang of the game real quick. Played it well. He surprised me here and there along the path behind the cedar trees, entwined in the rose trellis or where the ferns live. He could disappear wiggly quick. I had to acknowledge his fluid dexterity. So, from time to time I reported his escapes and passed him off as some kind of tolerated pet. So that, perhaps, is the cause of his new uppity attitude.

He has attempted to take over as host when company comes. Recently, as a guest was departing, there he was lying on the warm concrete front steps, slightly hidden by the overhang of the porch floor, ready, apparently, to offer whatever kind of friendly good-by a snake makes.

My guest didn't see him until he had descended the steps and turned to look back. He calmly said, "You've got a snake."

"Oh, it's just Old Stripe," I calmly replied, but was really vexed that Stripe could take such a bold position with a departing guest. He broke some long-standing, vague covenant we had that he was to stay out of sight when other persons were around. I'm the boss and hostess around here.

Old Stripe, if he could talk, might say, "Well, first of all (everyone starts a response these days with "first of all"), you put the petunias all up and down the steps here, and all kinds of insects visit the flowers. I just love insects and slugs. Did you know you had a lot of fat slugs?"

Thus snakes, descendants of the Garden of Eden serpent, try to change the subject or make a little doubt creep in. Could I have enticed him to be on the front steps?

Anyway, I'm not going to mention him anymore, at least for a long time. Starve his publicity hunger! Make him humble!

I speak of him as a he and hope that is the case, for female garter snakes can give birth to as many as 78 babies at once. But then he's a partner in this snakedom over procreation.

I've seen such appalling snake litters. Country kids see so much more of procreation than city kids. And so much of oddities that others only read about. I swatted a spider once and about 20 baby spiders exploded from its back. It was a mother Wolf Spider that carries her young on her back until they can fend for themselves, much as mother 'possums do.

Any kid about town know about doodle bugs or tumblin' bugs? Wanting to see if old things still worked, not long ago I saw several inverted cones of the doodlebug, or ant lions as they are more properly called, near the garage opening. I got down on my knees, put my mouth close to the inverted cone and called, "Doodle, doodle, doodle, doodlebug," just like I'd done hundreds of times as a kid. Sure enough, the sides of the inverted cone began to slide downward and soon the fangs of the ant lion appeared. I looked up and there, nearby was the meter reader passing nearby. "I'm calling up a doodle bug," I lamely explained. He shrugged as if to say, "To each his own," and moved on. I got up and went into the house, sweating. It would have been so much better if I'd said, "I'm looking for my lost diamond ring." Or would it? He may have offered to help and that would have increased my lie by many powers. If he had said, "What's a doodlebug?" I would have been so pleased to explain that these little creatures build inverted traps so that, hidden just below the point, they can hear the slightest avalanche on the sides of the upside-down volcano and can come up quickly for a meal, mostly curious ants.

Arrogant snakes, curious doodlebugs, tumblin' bugs are all a part of my past or present. Makes for a novelty design on my tapestry of life.

REJOICE!

~Jean Bell Mosley is an author and longtime columnist for the Southeast Missourian.