Originally uploaded by bryanDeldridge
by Bryan Eldridge
With the end of May ushering in the unofficial beginning of Summer in three short weeks, what images spring into your mind?
I have spent a lot of time in Oxford, England aover the years and the one image that always meant Summer to me was that of the locals (and tourists) renting punts and heading out on the water on a lovely Oxfordshire afternoon.
Posted in Cultural Observations
Tagged England, Oxford, Oxfordshire, Summer, United Kingdom
In late February, I was schlepping my luggage around the back of my house after getting dropped off from the airport when I saw a pair of eyes looking at me down from my deck. It obviously wasn’t a cat and was standing on its hind legs so I assumed it was a possum or a raccoon.
That was until it turned around and started hopping away.
So, this isn’t exactly the kind of story you openly share with other people. Especially given that kangaroos aren’t really indigenous to Georgia. I am pretty sure any therapist would have told me that it was just my mind playing tricks on me due to all the stress at my job and a bum economy. After all, I was just coming back from a two week trip to Australia. I have experienced enough humiliation over the past few years and thought it best to just keep this to myself. Until now.
After several days I had more or less forgotten about the encounter and convinced myself that it had not happened at all. Then one day as I was walking to my carport to check the mail, something jumped out from behind the holly bush and hopped off into the woods. I have several feral cats that hang out around my house but this definitely wasn’t a cat. I was worried. It had either come back or I really was losing my mind.
There were two more sightings in the first week of April. These were definitely real. I was getting worried. Both instances were in daylight and one included a stare down that resulted in me screaming like a little girl and running down the street at dangerous speeds after I thought he made a move in my direction. In retrospect, maybe he just twitched his ear but he is still a wild animal, right? You cannot be too careful when it comes to wild animals. I may be crazy but I am NOT stupid.
Then, on the weekend before the Masters, I was watching the Atlanta news (which I never do) and they were talking about a new kangaroo rescue farm in Dawsonville. WHAT?!? Maybe I wasn’t crazy after all! Perhaps some drunk UGA frat boys had stolen a joey and it had escaped from their house on Milledge and found a home in the dense brush behind my back fence. Everything suddenly made sense. Maybe I wasn’t crazy after all.
Fast-forward to Friday afternoon – I was on a concall with a client when I noticed that my little friend from down under was looking at me from my front window, literally no more than six feet away from me. I was ready. Ever since the sightings started I have been keeping my camera right beside me for just such an opportunity. He moved after I took the first photo then he stopped at the end of my driveway and starting digging around for something that caught his attention. I was able to snap several more pictures before he hopped into my neighbor Rinna’s yard.
As fate would have it, said octogenarian was in her yard. I think her teeth popped out when she screamed. I almost peed myself. I had to fight my instincts to run over with a broom and chase it away but this was just too freaking good.
Minutes after Rinna shuffled inside her house gasping, cursing and screaming loudly (tee-hee) a police cruiser and animal control van rolled up in the church parking lot across the street. I threw on some shorts and a t-shirt and thought that it was only responsible for me to go outside and address the situation with the authorities. This was a big deal and needed someone in charge who knew all the details and could help our public servants get this crazed animal under control. I could wind up being a neighborhood hero or some shit like that. So I walked up to the vehicles as both officers were getting out of their vehicles and saying their hellos.
Officer: “Good afternoon, sir. Do you live in this neighborhood?”
Me: “Yessir. I live in the white house there. Is everything OK? I got a little concerned when I saw the animal control van. The last time I saw one of those there was a pet python that had escaped down the street. Snakes freak me out.”
Officer: “(Giggling) Well, no son, nothing like that. Have you seen anything unusual? Any wild animals in your yard, in your garbage, in the street – anything like that?”
Me: “Uh, no. Why? Did somebody report something?”
My plan was starting to come together. Just out of the clear blue. I have no idea where it came from.
Rinna started shuffling out of her house: “Officers! Officers! I am the one that called! I’m the one that CALLED!”
I looked at the police officer and animal control officer and rolled my eyes in as an exaggerated and animated manner as I could possible muster.
Rinna: “Briiiiii-UN! Did you tell them about the kangaroo?!? I am the one that CALLED!”
She was shuffling nervously across her yard towards us, looking left and right just in case the wild beast was waiting to spring out of a bush or perhaps a tree.
I turned my back toward Rinna, crossed my arms, and give the officers an arched eyebrow “Oh, boy…” kind of look. At least that is what I was shooting for.
Rinna: “Officers – I was picking up some debris in my yard when this kangaroo leapt out of HIS yard! Briiiiii-UN! Did you tell them about the kangaroo?!?”
Officer: “And, sir, you didn’t see anything – nothing unusual?”
Me: “(Smiling in a slightly patronizing manner) There are a couple of large feral cats that hang out around my house – but that’s about it. Rinna – are you sure it wasn’t just a cat?”
Now I was smirking like a cat myself. I am so cool.
I looked back at the animal control officer. She stifled a smile and looked down at her boots. She now knew that my neighbor was crazy. I was happy. Mean, cruel, petty – but happy, and that is all that mattered.
Then the police officer looked at Rinna with something approaching pity and said “M’am, could you show me where you think you saw this animal?”
Rinna: “(Obstinately) I DID see the animal and it WAS a kangaroo!! I know what I SAW!! I SAW a KANGAROO!!!!!!!!!”
She was getting very flustered and was obviously more concerned about proving her sanity at this point than anything else. (tee-hee)
Then in calming, dulcet tones, the police officer said “M’am, we are just trying to look at all the possibilities. If I seem skeptical, it’s just that I have been doing this job for 27 years and have never seen or heard of a kangaroo in this area. Have you? (looking at the animal control officer)”
Animal control officer: “Un, no…”
The animal control officer then looked at me and gave me a sly complicit grin. Almost flirtingly. Yeah, we were definitely in this thing together. My neighbor was freaking crazy but we had to indulge her cockamamie story because that is how you deal with the confused elderly. We were actually being nice. This could even be the beginning of something – I admit, the badge and large net she was holding was starting to turn me on. (Blushing.)
En masse, we made our way across the street to the location of the alleged “sighting.” This was starting to turn into a real good time…
Then, out of nowhere, I saw the happy little world based on deceit and neighbor-hating cruelty that I had spontaneously created falling apart. At the far end of my carport, that little rodent, that KA house refugee that had been de-pledged to the Eldridge Outback, was holding some leafs in his dirty little paws, looking me right in the eyes. Taunting me, really. Ozzie Frakker.
The instincts that tried to break through and protect Rinna earlier now kicked in big time. Keeping my story intact and humiliating Rinna was much more important than risking being bitten by a marsupial midget. After all, he may be able to jump up and bite my nuts but there is no way he could reach my neck. The physics were all wrong. So I told the group that I needed to run and grab my cell because I was on call (not sure where that came from) and needed to quickly jump inside my house. I would let them know if I saw anything along the way. (Evil laugh)
When I hit the carport, I grabbed the rake nonchalantly (in case they were still looking) and when I got to my car I crouched down and made a very aggressive move toward the beast with the rake well in front of me. At first he just gave me this “go fuck yourself” kind of look then he turned and leapt a good 8 feet in the direction of my backyard. I was damn relieved. I crept quickly down the path that runs parallel with my fence line to make sure he wasn’t hidden just out of sight. Nowhere to be found, I dropped the rake where I stood, pulled my cell phone from my pocket (tee-hee) and went back to join the party.
Once I rejoined the group, the police officer asked the animal control officer to escort Rinna around the “premises” to look for any signs of the animal. Although there was some risk involved with that maneuver, I saw it as a positive sign.
Officer: “Sir, have you ever observed Ms. Rivers display any confused or otherwise unusual behavior?”
Me: “Well…(insert long dramatic pause for effect here)”
Officer: “Its OK son – she’s not going to get in any trouble or anything, we just need to make sure she isn’t a danger to herself or anyone else. Any insight you could give us will actually help make sure she gets the help she needs.”
That was a major buzz kill. I started to feel guilty. I didn’t want Rinna to have to go in for a psychiatric evaluation again like she did when I paid 11 of the neighborhood kids to trick or treat her for 3 days straight last July all dressed as Satan and Barbara Bush. As entertaining as it may have sounded, that was taking things a little too far. And, after all, she really did see a kangaroo. Didn’t she? Didn’t I?
Me: “You know, she really is just a lonely old lady. Maybe she did see something, who knows? Either way, perhaps she just needed the attention and for someone to take her seriously. I don’t see this becoming a habit. I think she is likely fine upstairs. Mentally I mean.”
Officer: “Thanks, Mr. Eldridge. Here is my card. Call me if you see anything, OK?”
Me: “Yessir. Good luck.”
I am not sure on how things officially wrapped up next door but after basking in the excitement of all the days events for a little while, I settled back into work and reality.
Later in the evening, I met my tennis instructor down the toad at Memorial Park. While we were chatting and waiting for a court to open up, two young girls walked up from the nature center/petting zoo. They had on what looked like matching t-shirts and name tags. Surely they worked there.
Me: “Hey there ladies, you wouldn’t happen to have any kangaroos down at the petting zoo do you?”
I didn’t even think about it beforehand. The words just jumped from my mouth.
Girl 1: “(Giggling) No, but we do have a wallaby mix. He is cute but whatever we do he keeps getting out of his cage.”
!
Me: “How long has been out?”
Girl 2: “Well, he has been out several times since last fall but he is down in the secure cage now. He just came back from his latest escape a couple of hours ago.”
Me: “(Inappropriately excited) Can I see him?!?”
The girls kind of looked at each other like “WTF? Why is this guy so interested about seeing this rat?”
So even though they were officially closed, the girls led me to the secure cage and there he was. He was bigger than life but kind of smaller than I thought too. He hopped over to the front of the cage and put both of his paws through the openings. He wasn’t so scary anymore and he knew it. All he had left to play was the “cute” card and he knew how to play it well. I must have looked like a complete and utter weirdo to the two teenage volunteers but I stood there and had an honest to God moment with that wallaby. We just looked at each other for what must have been 30 seconds and then I just smiled and whispered “thanks” and turned and walked away. The volunteers said welcome but I wasn’t talking to them.
THE END
by Bryan Eldridge
OK – every now and then, something so unexpected happens that there are truly no words to describe the shock that you experience. This is the tale of such an experience.
I had a horrible time sleeping through the night on a recent trip to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. It could have been that the time difference lined up in such a manner that morning time here was perfectly aligned with bedtime back home. Who knows? At any rate, when I would wake up every morning at 4:30am or so, I would simply turn on the TV and channel surf hoping to find something innocuous enough to “white-noise” me back to sleep. Arabic TV shows seemed to do the trick so I would click around until I found one of the many Arabic soap operas to lull me back to sleep.
The format of the Arabic soap opera seemed fairly straightforward to me: Arabic men argue with Arabic men typically over the state of health of one of their wives in a hospital or doctor’s office. That seemed to be it. Given that you can’t show women’s faces, set up romantic tension, or have anything sexual, drama over health seems to be the only creative device to titillate and captivate the modern Muslim audience. Having said that, last Tuesday morning I tuned into such a soap opera hoping to catch 40 more winks before having to get up and get ready.
Before I closed my eyes to try to go back to sleep, to my sheer wonderment and disbelief, two Arabic men were leaving the hospital after a nasty spat with a physician only to find Batman waiting in a tree outside. Yes, that Batman. Well, sort of. This Batman had obviously found the relatively crime-free environment of Riyadh (Arabic for “Gotham” I came to find out) a good excuse to slip slightly out of tip-top shape.
Batman proceeded to scold the men (as best I could tell) then the seemingly repentant pair cajoled the Caped Crusader out of the tree only to overpower him and tie him to a tree in the desert, leaving him to bake to death.
In a moment of dark despair, a black witch appeared (an ugly wench with no front top teeth) on a broom and appeared to tempt the Dark Knight into letting her help him. At that point, Batman snapped through his ropes and shooed the witch off as fast as his feet and girth would allow him. This wasn’t very fast.
At any rate, I snapped several shots of the television screen and pulled together a little visual storyboard of the action. You are going to crack up when you see their version of Fatman. I mean, Batman.
Originally uploaded by bryanDeldridge
