On the weekends I have been practicing meditation while hanging out in my spa. Many times a creature will come along to intrude on my space and distract me. So there I am in the spa, staring at a spot on the fan palm, and meditating. My husband meanwhile is floating around in the pool, trying to dodge the guy (commonly known as an automatic pool cleaner). A couple of weeks ago a lizard kept popping out of my spot of concentration, so I was sure something was going to appear. All of a sudden my husband screams out, “SNAKE”.
Okay, game on. I turn my head and see this teeny tiny black and white baby garter snake crawling into the pool area from underneath our screen enclosure. Seconds later, my husband jumps out of the pool and runs to the house to call the cats out so they can hunt and kill the snake. (Note to self, husband is a chicken shit.)
The cats are all nestled in their separate sleep quarters. Sparky the king of the house is in the top floor of the kitty sky rise that looms five feet off the floor. Top cat, in the top spot. Lucy is in the bedroom and Suzy at the sound of my husbands voice runs to hide under the bed (he scares the hell out of her). My husband keeps calling and calling. Come on Sparky, get out here and kill the snake. Sparky says, “I’m sleeping go away.” Ed not to be dissed by a cat demands that Sparky get off his throne and come outside. Eventually, after much noise and yelling, Sparky dismounts his position and slinks on over to the door. He stares up at Ed…squinting his blue, crossed eyes at my husband and says again, “What the hell is wrong with you, can’t you see I’m tired?” So Ed bends over, scoops him up in his arms, walks over to an area near the snake, but not too close, and drops the cat down on the ground. Sparky immediately walks off in the opposite direction. Stopping a few feet from the edge of the other side of the pool with his back to the snake he takes a rest. My husband now confident because there is a cat on the loose, goes back into the pool. He feels assured that at any moment Sparky will realize there is a snake slithering along the ground behind him and attack it. Only Sparky is so tired he can barely open his eyes and goes back to sleep.
Okay, so now Ed is getting really frustrated, I’m still hanging out in the spa, chilling in the summer heat and giggling to myself. Ed goes over to Sparky and scoops him up in his arms, carries him across the pool, Sparky of course is kicking and screaming fearing he is going for an unscheduled swim; when my husband plops him down on the other side. Once again, Sparky turns his back on the snake. At this point I realize that this snake is going to survive no matter how much my husband wants to kill him.
So there is Ed in the pool, petrified of this tiny snake, and Sparky wondering what the hell he is doing there, when he would rather be snoozing away in the house. At which point my husband begins a battle with the cat. He keeps spinning the cat around and screams, “go get the snake.” After a few spins, Sparky finally eyes the baby snake and pounces on it.
He straddles the snake between his four paws. Then with one of his giant paws whisks the snake into the pool right next to where my husband is standing. I begin to laugh my ass off at this comedy show. Ed runs from pool screaming on the top of his lungs and goes into the house.
I watch the snake gracefully swim to the deep end of the pool, circle around a few times and then come up to the surface. He starts for the edge when he spots Sparky come walking by and freezes in place until Sparky is out of sight. He continues his swim until he hits the wall. Unfortunately the tile is too slippery and he cannot climb out. So I go over pull him out of the pool and take him outside. Sparky and I head into the house. He heads for his castle and I head for the shower. That was a nice meditation session. I can’t wait to see what life has to show me next weekend.
Copyright © 2004 Sara Coslett
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