The Visitor

“Daddy, Daddy,” shouted my two-and-a-half-foot towhead.

“What is it, little man?”

“Mamaw and Papaw take me to see Big Boy!”

“That’s right, son, now go find your shoes and I’ll help you put them on,” I said as I entered the room. Seeing my husband’s quizzical look, I added, “Mom and Dad wanted to get a quick bite before they head back home. Are you able to come with us?”

“No, I still have a lot of work to do on these camp lessons and I leave tomorrow. Have fun and maybe bring me back a sandwich?”

This house had a unique floor plan from any other we had lived in. The garage and laundry room were in the basement. It was a pain to walk down the steep wooden steps each day with either a full laundry basket or a two-year-old. I had fallen more than once. But knowing that this was a rental and temporary made it easier.

Mom went down first, then I came down carrying the toddler. We were trying to decide who would drive and which car we would take when I heard my dad.

“Woah!”

“What is it?” I said as I turned to look, “Aaaaaaahhhh!”

Lying between me and my father was a six and a half foot long black snake as big around as the business end of a baseball bat. I am not sure how I had walked right past that spot without noticing it lying there in wait.

I turned to my mom and practically threw my son at her. Luckily, she was a good catch.

“You got a hoe?” My dad asked.

I wasn’t much of a gardener, but I looked around the garage and found something. I handed it to my father, and he laughed.

“What do you want me to do with this?” I had handed him my son’s plastic toy hoe.

“Well,” I said giggling, “You asked for a hoe.”

“I need something to use to get it out of here.”

“You mean something to kill it with,” added my mother, who was working hard to keep a very curious little boy from running up to play with the big snake.

The door from the house whipped open and my husband ran down the steps to see what all the commotion was about. He stopped half-way down when he saw our slithering visitor. I could see the conflict in his eyes. Knowing that snakes were his kryptonite, I figured he’d either watch from a distance or head back up the stairs. But to his credit he came down and grabbed the closest thing to him, a three iron.

My dad chuckle, “You’re gonna kill a snake with a golf club?”

“It was the first thing I saw,”

Dad looked around for his own weapon and grabbed a broom. Mom and I were both in stitches at the sight of my dad trying to sweep the snake away from some boxes and my husband hitting at it with a golf club.

“Get it, Daddy,” encouraged a very entertained young man.

“Yes, get it!” said my mom, who didn’t like snakes any more than my husband.

In my best Sherlock Holmes accent, I said, “It was my father, in the garage with the three iron.”

“We’re not playing Clue, this is not a game,” said my frustrated man.

Mom and I both were laughing so hard we had tears in our eyes. It may not have been a game, but it looked like one. Either that or a Three Stooges movie minus one stooge.

My dad had the snake pinned to the cement floor with the broom while my husband beat in its brains. Finally, it was dead, but it was still in the garage. Dad took the golf club from hubby and lifted the snake up from its middle.

“Boy, this is heavy! Quick, someone open the garage door.”

That enormous snake slipped off the gulf club three times as dad made his way to the outside. By this time, it had begun raining and was pretty yucky outside.

“Don’t leave it on the driveway,” I said

Dad gave me a duh look. Then he lifted club and wound up for a swing to fling it off in the ditch next to the drive. That big ole snake just wound around that club like a tether ball on a pole. Dad made some grunting noises as we shrieked and guffawed.

Then there was a loud boom and a lightning strike. “Be careful!” yelled my mom, “Don’t get electrocuted.”

Behind me my husband imitated a newscaster, “Man killed while trying to remove snake from local couple's house. Film at eleven.”

Now even dad was laughing so hard that he couldn’t do anything. He was soaked and still standing out in a thunderstorm holding that snake wrapped golf club bent over in a belly laugh. Once he tilted it towards the ground, the snake slid off. Then dad putted that huge reptile off the driveway.

With the snake out of the way, we headed off to lunch but could think or talk of little else than the image of my father standing in the rain holding a snake on a golf club.