May 27, 2004
a tiny flood
At the end of the backyard, the place where someone else's property begins, is a magical land. In this magical land, know as SprockTown, Sprocket has adventures of the most marvelous kinds.
Lately, you see, she has a monkey. She's been wanting to have a monkey for quite a long time. Ever since that cell phone ad where there was a sick monkey brought in place of something else. Which I don't remember. I think it was for Sprint, too, but I don't truly recall. La la la.
At any rate, Sprocket has her little monkey. The first thing she did when she got it was to eat him. She burped it back up, but he wasn't a happy monkey for quite some time. He ran away to the woods near SprockTown. Sprocket could be seen sitting near the woods looking around in a way that looked disinterested to me. I suppose it was supposed to look placid. A kind of "I'd never eat another monkey" look.
I went back there, with permission from Sprocket (wouldn't want to trespass) with the intention of killing some poison ivy. I think I'm going to have to leave the spot alone, though. SprockTown is too wild for me. Today I gingerly stepped through the leaves and sticks. The moss-covered sticks that looked as though they'd hold me crumbled under my feet--no snappy sounds. These were sticks only in that the contents were held together by bark.
These were not woody sticks. These were would-be sticks. Or would were. Or wood were. I'm sure you understand.
I put my hand against a tree to steady myself and the tree fell over. Have you ever done that? Just touch a tree and Whoops! Sorry, sweetie, but I knocked your tree over with my delicate little self. (batting the eyelashes here doesn't hurt)
It was not my overpowering strength that tipped the tree over. It was very dead already. I was waiting for woodpeckers to come flying out to carry me away.
(Hey kids! Woodpeckers work together to raise young over generations! The kids stay home and help the mom and dad to raise the next set of young. It is hypothesized that the young woodpeckers are too lazy to make their own nest. It is a lot of work to hollow out a tree, I suppose. But really, to wish death on your parents so you can get the house? I think they're going to add a new genus to the Picidae order: Menendez.)
At any rate, Sprocket was not pleased that I'd rearranged her town. She's still calling me Godzilla and Chewbacca. I'm not pleased.
The tree caused a minor earthquake in SprockTown, you see. The monkey was chee-chee-ing at me and I ran away from there through the stream that seems to run through our yard this year.
The monkey is very small, small enough to be burped up by Sprocket who is the size of a large loaf of bread. I saw that monkey jump into a small boat and sail down through the grassy stream. He only went maybe ten feet, but he also didn't drown in the havoc I caused.
Woe is me! What to do?!
Sprocket walked the monkey back up to the wooded part of SprockTown. He rode on her back. He still doesn't trust her, but he's pretty calm as long as he has a grip on her collar. He says he owns her, but Sprocket just sits among the buttercups and lets them blow up her nose while she sniffs and snorts all that she's waited this winter to sample.
Posted by dotty at May 27, 2004 09:52 PM