Invitation to act like a wild woman
Ah, spring and summer in North Carolina. It’s turtle time!
Turtle time?
You bet! Those endearing, house-carrying (their own, that is) creatures listen to their inner mating calls and head out - everywhere. Their species has no exposure to traffic school, so “everywhere” is inclusive of blithely crossing any road that might fall on their migratory routes. “Yep, let’s just cross that asphalt sucker.” No street sense at all.
These brave and brazen turtles do NOT look both ways when starting across a road. They instinctively stop and pull into their respective shells, as a protective measure, in response to those monstrous metal contraptions, with wheels, trundling in their direction. (Protective measure? Yeah, right.) And thanks are often proffered to those crazy humans who choose to rescue them by peeing on their caring hands.
And yet, we rescuers keep coming back….
Here’s a turtle sucker’s most recent rescue episode.
Driving home down a busy country road. (That’s an oxymoron, isn’t it? “Busy, country road.” Oh, well.) Catch sight of something small in the road ahead of me - small and moving. Oh no, it’s a small six-inch box turtle. Eeek! Pull over to the side of the road, put my car blinkers on, and begin the long limp toward it. I say “limp” since I’m wearing a bulky exoskeleton brace on my right knee, helping to keep me upright prior to knee surgery.
A car comes over the hill, heading toward the itty-bitty turtle! I begin wildly waving my arms and pointing toward the road. The car avoids the turtle and also parks roadside. I hate to admit that my first thought, seeing the parked car, was “does the driver think I’m having an emotional breakdown and is coming to save me?” But, no, she grabs a cloth from her car and also heads toward the wayward turtle. A kindred turtle soul! This is North Carolina, after all, where rampant yellow pollen and turtle rescues are harbingers of warm weather.
OMG, now there are multiple cars coming from both directions and, somehow, I find myself standing on the median yellow line. (Wait, is this safe?? Do they see me? Maybe they’re not from NC and don’t know about our turtle rescue culture?) Now I’m in full-body gesticulation, pointing toward the not-easy-to-see little shelled adventurer. My kindred turtle soul reaches the determined, crawling, critter and moves it to the opposite side of the road. Ah, well done! Excellent turtle etiquette!
I stop holding my breath (oh, wow, it does feel good to breathe again.) Limping back to roadside safety and to meet up with my fellow turtle rescuer. We thank each other. (Damn, considering all the traffic encountered, we should’ve been jumping up in the air and high-fiving. But that particular behavior will need to wait until I have a new knee.)
Turned to go back to my car. The other big-hearted rescuer said, “Here, let me walk you safely back.” I suddenly felt deflated. Do I appear that helpless? That decrepit with my knee brace? Decided, however, to perceive her gesture as a kindness, instead. I guess rescues occur in all forms, don’t they? With gratitude for the rescued turtle and for my capacity to accept a small, kind, rescue-of-sorts, as well. Go turtles! Go humans!
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lovely as usual