Reptile Dysfunction

So the liner of the old "above-ground" pool had been removed and my hippy brothers were determined to make use of the 4 foot metal enclosure for a pond and reptile habitat.

I had just turned 12 and was used to cleaning up the mess left behind from car parts and junk scattered throughout the universe of my disorderly home. (There is something about the 2nd law of Thermodynamics and Entropy Increase...that Irene, our once-a-week house keeper, and I worked very hard to push against constantly).

Trying hard to contain the mess was part of my nature, but the need for order or hard work just didn't seem to be on the cosmic menu for the herbal loving - easy going, carefree lifestyle of Haight-Ashbury influenced children of the 60's.

To see all the "long-hairs" out in the backyard with shovels in hand and sweat on the brow was quite the enigma and a demonstration of the commitment they had to this "pond" project of theirs.

Another paradox was the unusual care and attention to these particular plants that they were cultivating out in the very far reaches of the backyard.  To walk over clutter and and pay no attention to the disastrous disorder of our  house was more inline with their blithe character than was care, concern and cleanliness or anything that hinted of a modicum of elbow grease. So shocking was the paradox of this new found work ethic, that my Dad had to ask about this meticulously attended garden which had been deliberately hidden behind stacks of decaying Saint Mark's carnival booths (stored for centuries in our backyard).

"Mexican Tomato Plants," they told my dad!
 My dad raised a suspicious eye-brow and walked
 away.

I was curious as to why these beloved "tomato plants" got so much attention - especially since the dumb things never grew tomatoes.     What's up with that?    

Not only did my older boys water, weed and meticulously prune the leaves, but they also imported a 3 foot, mutant, wild eye'd, attack-rooter with 4 inch razor sharp spurs to guard the cursed plants.

Life use to be good for an imaginative kid in that great big 'O backyard of ours, but now it was a nightmare with that Veloci-Rapter of an guard-rooster hunting down and attacking anything that came near those precious plants.  

My dad always seem frustrated that the older boys just didn't seem to care much about anything having to do with keeping the place clean, so I did the best I could to try to please him. 

Only problem was that I think it made them mad and is probably why they tied me up and buried me and shoved me in that hamper of death...(blog 6/5/13) and maybe even kept their mouth shout when my parents left me behind at Salton Sea (blog 5/27/13). .

Anyway, the pond was near completion and at twelve I was up to taking a shower about once a week- whether I needed to or not. Today, however, no one was home and I felt that it was safe to take a bath. Usually that wasn't a good idea, because there was no handle on the door to the bathroom with the bathtub near my parent's room. You never knew who would walk in or what kind of torture they might put you through - like throwing hot or cold water on you or bring friends in to look at you naked.

None of that was fun!

I hadn't been in the bathtub in months and thought I'd give it a try. I turned on the water and let it run while I stripped down. I slightly pulled back the shower curtain and stuck one foot in the bathtub...
             ...do you remember the scene from the horror flick, "Psycho" - in the shower scene with the crazy-scary music?    Well, this was like that!

 Insert music from your head here...

No one was home and our house was scary enough.  I told you before that it was haunted by ghost or demons or other-world stuff that wasn't too good for a person my age. And so it was easy to be a bit jumpy...and afraid of noises and things that go bump in the night. So as I stuck my foot into the tub and was looking at the faucet to adjust the water temperature... something splashed inside the tub and grabbed a hold of my ankle. Okay this is the point where - if I wasn't just a kid - I probably would have had a heart attack and died. Something was alive in the tub. A dead corpse - maybe, that had come to life...and this thing (what-ever-it-was - began furiously flailing - the Creature from the Black Lagoon...a monster- LEVIATHAN!

I slipped and fell head-long on top of the cold creature and was eyeball to eyeball with death itself.


I stared into the eerie slit pupil of the alligator my brothers had been secretly storing in the tub awaiting the completion of the pond project.

I don't know who was more scared me or the alligator?  It opened it's mouth in fright.. I screamed and think the Lennons down the street could hear the shriek of my death cry. 

Both of us splashed helplessly flinging water out of the tub as the curtain tore off bar and fell over the top of our two naked bodies. The young cayman had razor sharp teeth, but somehow I managed to free myself without incurring a single wound and ran from the room dripping wet.

One flight of stairs... two flights of stairs.. down I ran.  Scared, wet, I ran down past the foul mouthed mynah bird into a oncoming gaggle of my sisters and her friends just entering in through the front door..

Scared, dripping wet and...oh yeah - NAKED!

Yeah, like they believed me that I just survived an alligator attack! 

That might be "TMI" (Too Much Information) so please just accept it, but don't feel you have to visualize it... I'm still traumatized by this memory - hopefully you won't have to be.

Just for clarity - it wasn't the alligator attack that I was traumatized by... it was the mocking of my sister and her friends who stood there and stared and pointed and laughed at me.

Hey,  it was cold by the time I got down stairs!

That wasn't a lot of fun. What I discovered is that girls can be just as mean as the Wolf Pack.

"An idyllic childhood is probably an illusion."
                              - Martha Grimes

Next time - the fatal accident!