The Bravery of a Knight

Creatures of nature rarely scare me, although I’m likely to go into cardiac arrest if a grasshopper manages to land on me. I hate those things! As a youngster I used to catch them and wait for them to excrete their molasses on my hand...what was I thinking?! I am not all that fond of snakes either but in Maine, we rarely see one and they are not poisonous. I am not likely to go digging in the trees for a golf ball in Florida, but since I gave up golf I haven’t seen a single one. Good thing. I’m not likely to die of a snake bite, but the cardiac arrest thing would get me for sure.

Before we bought our condo in Florida we used to vacation in various parts of Florida, especially the Keys. We had checked into a lovely cottage on Siesta Key, went for a swim, and unpacked for a week of relaxation and sunshine, and I had opened a bottle of chilled Chardonnay to enjoy. We were going out for dinner and, as usual, I was ready long before my hunny, so I took the wine and glass out on to the patio. The air was warm and muggy, but a soft breeze kept me comfortable as I looked around at the palm trees and flowers that surrounded me. The stress of the travel day from Maine began to loosen in my shoulders, or maybe it was the wine. Anyway, I happened to look down at the broken paver by my feet and reminded myself that it was likely to catch a clumsy footfall before the week was over. Then, my eye caught it. A prehistoric monster was beneath the paver!

I quickly yanked my feet up into the chair and yelled for my knight in shining armor to come and slay the dragon! Even he was taken aback as he studied it from a six-foot distance (social distancing). Years before he had a bad experience with a snapping turtle in Maine so he chose not to go poking it with a stick. Meanwhile, I was chugging wine straight from the bottle, sure that death would soon take me.

Instead of being an adult and realizing that I wasn’t going to die, I climbed over the patio fence and went to the office to tell them about this dragon-like creature that had invaded my palace. My heart went warm looking back to the cottage just in time to see my knight climbing over the fence. Such bravery!

When we returned from dinner the broken paver had been replaced and the space beneath it was filled with sand. However, atop the patio fence were two huge iguanas eyeing us as we quickly went inside. The half bottle of wine I had left on the patio earlier was just going to have to stay there because there was NO way I was going back outside after dark!