Never Step on a Snake Barefooted

Growing up in the woods of Louisiana was probably the most enjoyable period of my entire life. I absolutely loved the woods and spent most of my days in those woods, playing in them, roaming them, and climbing hundreds of them. I recall a few times when very strong winds would hit us, likely from hurricanes ripping across the Gulf of Mexico. I would sneak out the back door at my grandma’s house and find a tall pine tree in the forest behind the house. I’d climb up near the top of that tree and enjoy an exhilarating “ride” as the winds whipped the tree back and forth.

Someone once asked me whether I was afraid of falling out of the tree or the tree breaking. I really had thought of that but never worried about it because I was confident of being able to hang on to the tree, and if perchance it broke, there were enough branches that as long as I held on, they would break my fall. So, I was never afraid. No circus ride could match it.

Running Wild in the Louisiana Woods

I was eight years old, and as I did virtually every day of my life back then, that day I was roaming the woods. I was in my typical garb, short pants, shirtless and barefooted. As a child, I loved to run. Sometimes, I would just run for the sheer joy of running, exhilarated with life. I ran everywhere.

Sometimes, I would pretend I was Tarzan and was being chased by wild natives, or chased by a lion. Some days, I was a cowboy running my horse after the bad guys. My imagination knew no bounds.

I was running full-out on this particular day and I leaped across a log in my path. Instantly, I knew I was in deadly peril. My bare foot had landed on something soft and it had spread beneath my foot until it covered most of it.

Stepping on a Deadly Viper Barefooted

I knew immediately what I’d landed on: a deadly cottonmouth moccasin snake. Lying alongside logs was a favorite resting place for them. It sheltered them from the heat of the day and as a kid growing up in woods filled with these snakes. I had one friend who’d been bitten by one and nearly died, so I knew certain things about them, including where they often could be found.

As that flesh beneath my foot spread out, I felt it almost immediately constrict and harden. In that flickering second, I realized the snake was reacting to the sudden trauma it had received an knew that it’s deadly fangs were reaching for my bare leg.

But, it missed me.

I ran blindly through the woods, certain that the snake was chasing me. Indeed, I ran for so long that I actually got lost. I literally had run until I was totally exhausted. It took me several hours to find my way back home.

Once more in my short years on earth, death had reached out for me.

Once more, it missed me.

But, death would reach for me again, soon.

The End

copyright 2020 Voyle A Glover