Texas tornadoes and the snakes who live here

Within a week, we've seen two snakes boldly crossing our long, gravel driveway. One a copperhead. Very venomous. One a black rat snake. Non-venomous, but more aggressive.



One died at the hands of a shovel. The other died by the quick work of two faithful dogs who also happen to be serial snake killers.





This was the same week 16 tornadoes touched down in one afternoon along the corridor where I live in Texas. Unbeknownst to me, while I watched "Born to Be Wild" at the Omni Theatre in Fort Worth, a twister hopped right over us and plopped down to our east. The same one that was throwing semi-tractor trailers around.

Yeah, that one.

{On a side note, "Born to Be Wild" review: Meh.}

Thankfully I was stuck with a bunch of friends who had i-phones and internet service. We hung out for several hours as tornado after tornado moved along our route home.

The storms moved directly in our path and along the exact road and direction we needed to get home. To make matters worse, the storms were moving slow.

So, we waited.

And waited.

Then moved to a bookstore and waited some more.

And then on to a restaurant, where we waited even longer for food. {Note to self: when you walk in with 18ish kids and 6ish adults at the Macaroni Grill, you're gonna wait.}

Other friends, where holed up in a Costco, east of Dallas, as tornado warnings kept them locked inside. My Hubby even ran for cover as a tornado was reported to be heading right for his workplace. Family members and friends had to seek cover over and over again.

Everyone I know survived and collapsed to bed that night.

And the snakes are out.

It's the season. I've come to imagine it as snake mating time or some such thing. Typically snakes do stay safely hidden away.


But they're out in force.

There's a possible water snake on the front pond. A bigger pond now. We enlarged it's borders when it dried up in the drought last year. And there's a suspicious water snake on the back pond, closer to our new house. My oldest son thinks himself a snake catcher.

Did I mention the time he "accidentally" touched a Cottonmouth?

Yeah.

He was trying to grab the baby Brown Snake he'd been handling a few moments before he released it into a patch of lilies.

The same patch the Cottonmouth was coiled and patiently waiting for us to take our leave. Until our son touched it and exclaimed he found the "big, brown snake". That's when the "big, brown snake" became the big, headless snake.

Part of our homeschooling curriculum is snake identification. Go figure.

There's a metaphor here or something deeply profound to write.

But some days there's the need for simplicity.

And tornado shelters.