When I first came to live on the plantation with Jess, I was sitting in the house one morning, checking email and waking up. Jess, outside watering landscaping yells, "Hey honey! Come here!"
I walk out on the screened porch and Hy is pointing to a 6' black snake sunning in the grass not two feet from the front door.
With the high pitched screech heard as far west as Memphis, I was back in the house, on the phone with my father. It went a lil something like this:
Me: "DADDY!!!! How do you get rid of snakes without killing them?!?!?"
My father: "Well, punkin, what color is it?"
Me: "black"
Father: "Well, what shape is its head?"
Me: "I have no fucking clue, I didnt get that close"
Father: "what shape is its eyes? are they slanted?"
Me: "I wasnt that close. I didnt ask its heritage."
Father: "Well, how many are there?"
Me: "I dunno - I didnt ask if he had friends and family. How the FUCK DO I GET RID OF IT?!?!?!"
He then proceeds to go into a litany about good snakes and bad snakes and how we wanna keep the good ones...
KEEP the GOOD ones?!?!?!?!?!?
I didnt go back out into the yard except to the car and back for a good month.
Don't even get me started about how the next year as I went across our dirt road to check the mail and there was one laid out across the drive, blocking my path back to the house. Or how I was stuck out there for a good hour. Or how I refused to check the mail anymore without being armed.
Snakes... not my thing. Not then, not now, not never.
