A Father’s Day Special: SNAKES
A Father’s Day Special: SNAKES
When I turned 50, my son Andrew wrote a song about his dad, me, with lyrics that read something like, HOW IN THE ####! DID YOU SURVIVE YOUR CHILDHOOD?
That’s because he and his siblings have grown up in an enlightened world where “risk” has been removed from childhood. In the name of safety, we now buckle up, harness in, and strap down our children in our cars and on their bikes. They wear double-insulated helmets and safety goggles, and their seats can be used as flotation devices.
It is almost beyond their comprehension that their grandparents allowed us to roam freely in a car, ride in the back of a pickup truck, bike without helmets and with as many people hanging onto the bike as possible, and roam the neighborhood, often WITHOUT SHIRTS OR SHOES OR, OH HORRORS, SUNSCREEN!
I am ashamed to say that I got sucked into this namby-pamby way of raising children, removing practically all fun and adventure, and, consequently, not one of my children has broken an arm or nose, been hit in the face by a BB, attacked with bottle rockets, chased by raging bovines, thrown off a galloping horse, or shot at by an irate farmer.
(But of course they sleep peacefully at night while my brothers and I suffer from a form of post traumatic stress syndrome).
Nevertheless, we were raised at a time of Tom Sawyer bliss – ignorant of the perils around us; and we were happy. That brings me to the topic of “SNAKES.”
What is it about a boy and snakes? My brothers and I, and our friends, were TERRIFIED of these poisonous vipers that warmed themselves on the banks of the irrigation canals just north of our neighborhood. But we were drawn towards them like a fly to honey. There was a particular spot where snakes always gathered for a “picnic” and sunbathing.
We would creep up to the canal with the stealth of a ninja and leap out like a bunch of lunatics with clubs in hand to, yes, I am ashamed to say, kill as many snakes as possible. (This is another thing that our children simply cannot understand. As much as we “lived and breathed” the outdoors, we had no clue about all the “save the whale/harbor seal/alligator/spotted owl/earth” movements.)
And of course, after we chased the snakes away, we “accidentally” fell into the canal; at least that’s what we told our mothers. Mothers are kind of dumb sometimes. They believed the same story week after week even though we never came home with wet clothes. And as for being afraid of being bitten by water moccasins (also known as the highly venomous Cottonmouth) while skinny dipping, we were confident of our safety because everyone knows that “snakes can’t bite under water.” That’s what we told one another: that “if they open their mouths they’ll drown.” Ignorance is bliss; and also ignorant!
Once, as my friend and I walked through a pasture, we came across a water moccasin crawling into a hole. Yes, we smashed its tail and killed it… or so we thought. I grabbed the deadly reptile by its crushed tail and began pulling the snake out of the hole, and pulling, AND PULLING, and it was almost as long as me when the head finally appeared, MOUTH WIDE OPEN! Something told me that this was one angry snake as it lunged towards me.
AGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I am writing this so you know that I lived and, well, the snake didn’t. I am terribly sorry about how I treated wildlife as a boy and will spend days and days in purgatory for the terror my pals and I heaped on those innocent snakes. And now my own children do treat the animal world with respect and do wear helmets and seat belts!
But, to the point of the article: Father’s Day. Now, my Dad was not only terrified of snakes, he would not step out of his house if he knew one was within 500 yards. But he let us go out, explore, discover, take risks. I am so grateful that he (and Mom) said “go” when we asked if we could explore the world around us.
Jean Vanier, the founder of L’Arche, once wrote that the great gifts that parents give their children, are “Welcome, you are loved,” and “Go, you are gifted.” The great tragedy of today is that too many children are hearing this only from their mothers or grandmothers. Children desperately need their dads to be a part of their lives, saying “Welcome, you are loved” from the time of their conception to their birth, then throughout childhood and their entire life. And children need to hear from their dads as they begin to grow: “Go out into the world, explore, discover, take risks… but wear a helmet when you do!”
