The Turtle

On Sunday, I received my official birthday present from Diana.  An all expense paid trip to the J Crew outlet in Aurora Illinois!  Oh…sweet sweet plaid shirts. All the colors of the rainbow.

This magical journey also allowed the boys to visit their grandpa in nearby Lisle for come good old fashioned cane fishing at the pond.  Elijah and Luca couldn’t stop squealing about it.  They’d shriek, “Yay!  Dad is going the bike store and we get to fishing with Papa!”

I’m not sure how they got confused that I was going to the bike store instead of the vaguely sissy store, but I preferred it that way.

After I drove back from the mall, I found a note on Di’s Dad’s place instructing me on how to find the fishing hole.

I arrived to find both boys happily covered in a paste of fish good and mud.  They bombarded me with stories of barracuda catching and worm vivisecting.  I heard a delighted slash frightened shriek from pond-side.  Diana had snagged a fish.

No, make that a turtle.

We rushed over to see the little guy.  He was about the size of your fist and was dark green, or as J Crew would call it, “Vintage Sage.”  Oh, and he had a hook sticking out of his skull.

Yeah, Diana’s enthusiasm to yank the little guy out of the water had resulted in a little unplanned brain surgery. 

Eli shouted, “Is he going to be okay?”

Diana’s dad unconvincingly said, “Oh yes.  He’s a tough little guy.”  He began trying to extract the barbed hook from the turtle.  Not to save him, mind you, but because we needed the hook. 

The boys huddled around their grandfather while he yanked on the hook.  I prayed, “Please, do not take off its head.  Please.”

With the dexterity of a man who has yanked many a hook from many a turtle, he succeeded.  Eli said, “Oh look!  It still has a worm in his mouth!”  I thought, “That ain’t a worm. That's his brain.”

Diana dad stood up and said, “Let’s get him back to his house.”  And then threw the turtle as far as he could across the pond.  And we all hoped it wouldn’t immediately come back to the surface, belly up.

Diana quickly announced it was time to go home for lunch and we had a delicious meal of chicken and pasta and I refused Diana’s request to do a fashion show.