Engrained and Indelible

“Don’t KILL it!  They eat the MICE!”

–     Dick Heston, every time I killed a snake, which was every time I saw a snake, including Wednesday…but then, he never saw a rattle snake, now, did he?

…and Wednesday afternoon, I killed the snake.

We’ve lived in Texas now for two years, and prior to 5:23 PM, I’d not seen a snake.  Technically, I didn’t see it until The Mother of The Three saw it, and The World’s Largest Labradoodle engaged it in a game of “stare down.”

“It” was about 44″ long, and it had seven or eight rattles — and it is now in seven pieces.  I assure you that all seven pieces are dead.  The coroner has not weighed in but the reptile.  Is.  Dead.

It took a spade and a long shovel — the long shovel to hold it and the spade to commence creating the aforementioned seven pieces — but all seven pieces of his rattle-snaking a** are, in fact, exceptionally dead!  I’d have shot him, but I am out of shells and the shotgun was not readily available, seein’s how we live in Stepford, but I digress…

The weird thing is, shovel(s) in hand, there was clear voice ringing through my head the entire time I was flailing away at him.  (Make no mistake, had Mrs. H had the wherewithal to video tape the execution we’d have video definition for the term “whacking away like you were killing snakes”).  In my head, like he was standing nearby, I could hear Dick Heston, dead since 2002, hollering, “Don’t KILL it!  They eat MICE!”

I killed the snake.  I gleefully and mercilessly killed it.  Dead.  I cursed it.  I made up new curse words while I was killing the snake.  I cursed piece #1 – piece #7, and I cursed it with a passion and creativity that made my heart race.  In fact, my heart rate peaked somewhere around 462, I’m pretty sure.

A few hours later though, what is impressed upon me isn’t the threat to the World’s Largest Labradoodle, or to the Mother of The Three, or even The Three.  It is the indelible, engrained lesson from Dad, echoing in my ears, ringing through my brain.  Like many of them, I didn’t heed the lesson — unlike most of them, in this case I am right and dad was wrong.  They’re snakes, for chrissakes.  They started the whole problem…  Still, the lessons engrained in me by my father are a) dominant in my mind and b) clear and tangible in my instincts.  Right or wrong, good or bad, though, the lessons remains, because of the role and the character of the teacher.

What are the lessons we engrain, indelibly?  In whom do we engrain them?

It’s worth considering whether they’re lessons worth teaching, if our goal is to make a difference.

P.S.  A rambling post, no doubt fueled by the adrenaline of killing the reptile (or the single barrel bourbon involved in calming my nerves, post-homicide).  This is not to say my dad’s lessons weren’t important.  They were!  It’s just to call out the power of the impact we have when people look up to us.  I am not sorry I killed the snake.  Heck, I’m damn near giddy that I killed the snake.  I am, however, sad that I can’t call Dad and share the story with him.  He’d have laughed, and I miss his laugh — another indelible lesson he left with me…to laugh more and worry less…