When I was a girl, my dad’s mom, Grandma Hayes, lived in the Shawnee State Forest in southern Ohio. It was a beautiful place to live. At night, she’d open the family room windows and fill the house with the fragrance and music of Turkey Creek. A sound especially thrilling after a storm.
We cousins would run and play through the woods, lost in our own never-never land for hours. We’d fish from the bridge for minnows using Velveeta cheese as bait. I still can’t eat that stuff…
But being in the forest, we were always on the look out for snakes. Copperheads and rattlers were the big threats. Grans house was an older place with a bare necessity utility room with a bathroom and door leading out to the backyard.
It was the spare bathroom. And for some reason, I always imaged that one day I’d go to use it and find a snake in the toilet. Maybe I’d heard that Gran found a snake in there once before, I can’t remember. But I never, ever “sat” without a thorough look.
I just saw on the news a man found a snake in his toilet. That’s what made me think of it.
I never did find a snake in the toilet. And it’s been a lot of years since I’ve been to Gran’s home in the forest, but it’s still one of the happiest places I’ve ever been. Concern over snake in the toilet or not. 🙂
What is one of your childhood “fears?” Do you have a “childhood happy place?”
Comments 3
When I was a kid, I couldn’t let a leg or an arm hang off the side of the bed because I was sure an alligator or a monster under my bed would take a big bite out of it. My happy place was the pasture behind our house. It was great growing up on a farm in Oklahoma.
Laughing because I do that now. Always check. Because I’ve been told it could happen here in FL.
Never thought about such things in NY.
Ha ha.. Thank you for sharing the info.