The Farcical Fable of the Fearsome Feathered Mamba

It occurs to me I need to tell this tale in order to explain the 'feathered mamba' reference in my earlier swimsuit post.

I assure you this story is funny - and all at my expense. Which means it is funny for most people but slightly embarrassing for me.

About 4 years ago, my friend Cavey invited a bunch of us from the Professional Reading Chatboard on Teachers.net for a get-together at her mother's lake house in Virginia. The eMails and phone calls were flying during the month before the trip and one of the concerns I expressed was about snakes.

You see, I am not really a snake person although I do try to be and have become significantly less phobic over the past 10 years. The one snake fear I have to deal with accompanies my hikes on the Pacific Crest and other trails in the region. During the summer and autumn months, the rattlesnakes are out. Of all my hiking trips, I've only seen one and I heard one in a bush last September. But the fear is real, especially if I am hiking alone.

But other areas of the country have lots of different kinds of skeery snakes. And some of them like water. I have watched National Geographic and the Animal Planet enough to know that I am not being histrionic here. It is perfectly logical to expect snakes in Virginia - especially near water.

So naturally I asked and was not too pleased when Cavey casually replied that yes, they do indeed see snakes at the lake. "But they won't hurt you," she said. "Unless it's a copperhead."

I almost cancelled my tickets. I came this close. Black snakes? Copperheads? "Yeah, they like to curl up down by the water," Cavey said, with way too much serenity in her voice for my taste.

So, needless to say, I had to scan like a hawk the first time I went near the lake. There is a beautiful dock and cabana by the water - so wilder elements don't often make an appearance, I am told. Ducks, yes. But black snakes? Copperheads? "Well.. there was that one time..."

I swear that people in the South are much too relaxed about these things.

"They won't HURT you," Cavey said when we were treading water one day.

This, of course, is small comfort to somebody who absolutely dreads the possibility of sharing water space with a black snake. Well, with any snake, to be truthful. And with my luck, it would be a copperhead who spent too much time last night taking snakey licks out of Bubba's beer can - the one that dumped over on the dock down the shore. So he'll hit the water with one heck of a reptilian hangover, making him mean as a .... well, mean as a snake.

I was a grown up about it though, and took to the water like a fish. I loved it and since no snakes were ever in sight, I relaxed a little bit every single day.

So one lazy lake afternoon, I was treading water and talking to Cavey, Brad, and Grace as they lounged on the dock, nursing glasses of sweet tea and discussing vacation-related things like reading comprehension and the efficacy of computer-based fluency programs. In the water with me is Nik, Brad's wife, who is half asleep on the inner tube, lifting her head periodically to talk Brad into taking a swim or to proclaim that she is really, really, happy here in the water.

Cavey needed to repeat something to me because I hadn't quite caught it and did the old "HUH?" thing from the lake. As she came to the ladder she adjusted her sunglasses and began peering over my head towards an area of water about 20 feet away from me. After peering for a couple seconds, she leaned her head forward and looked harder. This caused me to turn around to see what she was looking at. Now, this is where accounts will differ. I truly don't remember saying anything but in my mind I was convinced that she was watching a big black snake swim through the water. Had I been rational, I would have turned around and looked better myself.

But I did not.

Somebody on the dock asked, "What is it?" at the same time I was swimming faster than I ever had in my entire life, counting the year I was on the swim team. I hauled my ample self UP the ladder and OUT onto the dock in one swift move that caused Cavey to reel backwards and almost dump her tea in Grace's lap. This caused Grace to jump up, which caused Brad to jump up.

In the meanwhile, Nik has seen me swimming wildly for my life and figures she will haul that tube to the ladder first and ask pertinent questions later. Her eyes had that "deer in the headlights" look as she attempted to get OUT of the tube and ONTO the dock.

Nik's reaction only served to reinforce that I was right all along - there are black snakes in that lake water, I just knew it! Nik saw it! She had to! Look at her face! Look how fast she swims in that tube!

Now, THEY will all tell you that I was the one who actually SAID the word "snake," which caused Brad and Grace to leap up and Nik to begin paddling hard enough to send her heart into arythmia. But I am sure that it wasn't me and that I was simply reacting the way any normal person would react when a really good and trusted friend starts peering at the water behind you in a very suspicious way.

As Nik is gasping for breath and I am turning around to see how many inches I came from certain snakey contact, Grace and Brad and Cavey are looking at the water very, very, closely.

"What is that?" asked Brad.

They all peered closer.

And then in a second and a half I became the butt of any and all future lake jokes.

"It's a stick," Brad said, with no small measure of delight.

"A WHAT?" yelled Nik, who was still clutching her chest.

"A stick," chortled Grace. "Yes - a stick!" I think she slapped her thigh but I am not certain. I was still reeling in fear and embarrassment.

Cavey is holding her sides laughing, snorting sweet tea out her nose while Brad points out the "stick" for Nik. She shoots me a rather incredulous look.

"Yes," said Brad dramatically. "It is the fearsome lake mamba. The feathered mamba, to be precise."

"Yep, that's it," agreed Cavey. "The feathered one."

"I need a beer," said Nik, and headed off towards the house, squelching her baser instict to push me back into the water, I am certain.

No amount of 'splaining on my part did any good. They would not agree, ever, that that moving black stick in the lake resembled a snake.

They also thought it was funny when I grumbled, practically under my breath, that mambas don't have feathers.