September and Parseltongue. . .

Yeah, it's September. . . and a 3-day weekend! I've already turned the calendars--porches and Liberty Enlightening the World--to new leaves.

Yes, the last three Harry Potter books were awesome--infinitely better than the first three (still have to read the 4th, the character development/coming of age one, or so I'm told). I'm still grieving for my lost hero (end of book 6) and, this misty September morning, wishing I knew how to speak in parseltongue.

I met a snake--the third of the summer. The first surprised me. Not much bigger than an earthworm. I watched it wriggle away. The second had an attitude. Tiny too, but it had to go. Snakes don't die easily. . .

This morning's was over a foot in length--big enough to command some respect, if not fear. I have mixed emotions about snakes. I remember the winter-sleeping copperhead that cost my brother half a wedding-ring finger (luckily not his arm or his six-years-young life!).. I remember the baby copperhead that fell out of the fish net (hung to dry in a tree) and onto my mother's head. I remember my own encounters with others of their species--BACK UP SLOWLY. DON'T ACT SCARED. WHEN YOU'RE FAR ENOUGH AWAY, RUN LIKE CRAZY. I'm still here, so apparently that worked.

But then there was Blackie, who wrapped himself around the vacuum cleaner in the dining room/hallway of our rustic mountain home when Jamie was a baby. Blackie, who kept the mice away. Blackie, whose silver shed skin came with us as a dual memo/trophy when we moved to South Carolina. We said he was a black snake. Apparently, or so I learned this year, thanks to Michael, he was a black RAT snake.

I really wanted that snake not to be there this morning, just inches from the yellow jacket nest that appears to have been abandoned without my intervention (or are there larva down there just waiting for the spring?). I wanted to eradicate the baby trees and vines that had sprouted there while I kept my distance (I decided maybe it was wise to respect a horde of yellow jackets) some of July and all of August. I asked this snake, very nicely, to move. He flicked his tongue but I haven't a clue what he said to me. . . He stayed. His turf.

So I looked him up, to give him a name. I think it's Thamnophis sirtalis, a mouthful for sure. Or should we call him garter snake? If he eats bugs I don't like, I might be thankful I spared him. If he eats earthworms--my woods are a fisherman's dream--I might think differently. . .

September, if not parseltongue. . . Glad it's here!