Word Rabies

“I knew foxes are quite often rabid, so I knew he was up to no good.”

This is a direct quote.

It is a direct quote from a North Carolina woman who woke up to find a rabid fox attacking her foot. She was in bed, her own—sleeping, at night, inside her house. The house had walls, windows, doors, and a roof. It was not a tree house or mud hut. She was not lost in the black forest. 

This is a direct quote, which I believe to be a shining example of an understatement.

“Up to no good.” Are you kidding? The fox was gnawing on her foot. It had managed to tunnel, smash, jimmy, or squeeze its way into this woman’s home, climb onto her bed, locate her vulnerable naked foot flesh, and zero in on its toe target—all why being infected with a hideous, fatal disease. How? Why? What the **hell?

“Up to no good.”  You mean the way Darth Vader was “up to no good?”

I love words, and as a writer, I am constantly fascinated with styles and methods of word usage via various forms of communication. How much is too much? How much is not enough? And how much is just plain kooky talk? Here’s a look at various forms of communication as it relates to rabid fox attacks, an important topic for the New Year, certainly.

An understatement is (according to the big book of word meanings) an intentional lack of emphasis in expression. For example:  I knew foxes are quite often rabid, so I knew he was up to no good. Duh!

Or,

That fox was like having a pack of teething toddlers chewing their way through my toe bits. This statement being an example of hyperbole, which is an exaggeration or extravagant statement, which differs from an exaggeration—somehow, but I’m still a little shaky on exactly how it differs.

The word exaggerate comes from a Latin word meaning to “pile up” or “heap.”  For example: There was a dumpster full of foxes heaped up in my bed—draining blood out of my body through my foot.

A question is an expression of inquiry that invites or calls for a reply. Is that a rabid fox attacking my foot? Honey, where’s the club?

An exclamation is an abrupt, forceful utterance; an outcry. Holy . . . mother . . . puss bucket! Smack it again! Harder!

The popular exclamation is often followed by or capped off with a declaration (An unsworn statement of facts that is admissible as evidence.) I found it, the clause in the insurance policy that covers rabid fox attacks—inside the house, under a king sized quilt. You’re covered.

Since the time this incident was first reported, I’ve taken to sleeping in my rubber garden boots and holding a crowbar in my clenched fist.

 So far, I’ve managed to avoid any ugly incidents where my husband staggers home some midnight hour from the airport, only to be welcomed with a crowbar up ‘side the head.

Whereupon I would have to declare, “But Officer, I thought my husband was a rabid fox up to no good.”

Linda (Hyperbolism Forever) Zern

** Please note: That although there are almost no situations in which I will make use of an expletive in my writing, there are a very few—one being rabid fox attacks or, possibly, pinworm infestations.   

A Thank You To Mrs. Teemant's Students From A Soldier's Mom

Remembering Aric's first homecoming and looking forward to his fourth homecoming in August 2011

Dear Mrs. Teemant and Students,

I am the mother of Staff Sergeant Aric Zern of “Baker Company” of the “1-506,” which is a combat unit out of Fort Campbell, Kentucky. This is a famous combat unit that many people might recognize from the HBO miniseries A Band of Brothers.


They are presently serving in Southeast Afghanistan on the Pakistan/Afghan border. It’s a combat unit, which means that they are actively searching for and engaging “bad guys” (bomb makers, gun runners, terrorists, and drug dealers.) The soldiers go on patrol in the mountains of Afghanistan for weeks at a time.

When the soldiers are on patrol they go without clean clothes, showers, or hot food, which means that when they come back to base and find packages, like the ones you sent, it makes them feel absolutely wonderful.

Your gifts help remind them who they are fighting for, and that person is you and Afghan children like you.

Your packages let the soldiers know that they haven’t been forgotten.

As the mother of a soldier, who is far away and fighting in a very dangerous place, your gifts make me and my family feel wonderful and grateful. It helps me know that the sacrifices our combat soldiers make are all worth it, because you are the kind of Americans who don’t just think about helping others. You are the kind of Americans who actually get up and do good things for others—just like soldiers.

Thank you so much.

For security reasons SSG Zern can’t tell me very much about where he is or what he is doing, but he has shared a few things you might find interesting about Afghanistan.  There is only one major paved highway in the entire country (making mail difficult to deliver); the average life expectancy is forty-seven years old; in the four months he’s been deployed he has seen three Afghan women; many of the people are descended from Genghis Khan’s Mongolian invaders; and most of the population cannot read or write.

Finally, SSG Zern would like for you to know that of all the people in the world, who wish for peace, pray for peace, and long for peace on earth, no one desires it more completely than the American combat soldier. But until that time, please know, SSG Zern and his men will be standing guard in the night so that you and your family can sleep safely in your beds.

Thank you again.

Sincerely,

Linda L. Zern (Proud Mother of an American Soldier)

The Book of Zern (The Chapter Following the Last One)

1.     These are the words of Linda, Queen and Groundskeeper of our people—even the YaYa Zern.

2.     Speaking forth those words to them that will hear, in this season of both Internet shopping and good-will-wishing under the mistletoe kissing.

3.     Yea, the days of our tribe did pass away this selfsame year as if in a dream—fueled by both: food that is fast and takeout Fridays.

4.     For I did yet hearken unto the nagging of my children and did continue to seek learning and knowledge—even at Rollins College, an Ivey league school or at least a school with Ivey that groweth upward upon the bricks of the walls.

5.     And the Queen’s children, even my own seed, did covet much of my excellent bedroom furniture and my fine credit rating.

6.     Surely, I did chastise them and say to them, doth the Queen have need of another pillow top mattress? Or doth the Queen not have power to write much of their deeds and doings and make it known to all the people round about?

7.     I say nay, or yea, or I shalt get back to thee.

8.     And Sherwood also called the King and First Rocker of Babies—in that not one of our people, could maketh a baby cease its wailing and sleep sound as he doth—did continue to tap much upon his computer keys in the language of acronym.

9.     For he did work much for the Babylonians in the land of the mighty lakes.

10.  Having gone forth, both Sherwood and his father, to Fort Campbell, Kentucky to retrieve SSG Aric Zern’s Jeep Sport Wrangler and drive it forth to our own land, so that when returning from the mountain wars of Afghanistan, Aric might come forth to claim his red Jeep chariot.

11.   Likewise, I did go forth, driving the red Jeep to the city gates and Wal-Mart and Gold’s Gym—while playing loudly of the drum and harp and thinking on sons who fight in far and distant lands.

12.   And Adam, even the youngest son said unto the world, I do make an end of learning in the spring, then my life will be as the voice of the Turtledove. And we, even his family, did mock him to laughter, but he did withstand all our mocking.

13.   He being strengthened in all things by his goodly wife, even Sarah, she having already made an end of her learning at BYU.

14.   And Heather did bring forth one Zachary called Flap Jack and Maren did bring forth Reagan called after a Republican, with their husband’s, one Phillip of Bountiful and T. J. of Titusville.

15.   And I said unto the daughters of our tribe, gird they sword upon they thigh and tighten all thy buttons for the children doth require thee to be stronger, longer than they.

16.   For they did number seven: Zoe the Woman-Child (7); Conner the Much Forgiven (4); Emma the Careful (5); Kip the Daring (2) and Sadie the Dramatic (2) and, of course, Zachary and Reagan (4 and 5 months in their first year.)

17.   Thus saith the YaYa, that I make an end of these words for this merry season of Christmas and doth wish goodness and joy on all those who dare to pick roses despite the thorns.

This old world sure is fine and mighty hard to beat.

With every rose you get a thorn, but ain’t the roses sweet.

Anonymous

Gator Up

A full-grown American alligator raced across the road, right in front of a taxicab full of tourists. I was driving my husband to the Orlando International Airport at the time.

“Hey, wasn’t that an alligator running across the road?” I asked.

“Yep.”

“Can you imagine being in a taxi on your first trip to Florida and seeing an alligator run across the road?”

“Yep.”

Sherwood doesn’t let a whole bunch excite him.

Which is a good quality, because when our boys were young it was nothing for us to have to make strange alligator related rules, like:

“Aric, you are not allowed to ask Adam, your smaller and younger brother, to jump on the back of alligators that you catch on fishing poles.”

Or,

“Adam, you are never, ever to do anything that your brother tells you to do—EVER.”

Occasionally, before nodding off to sleep, I would ask my husband, “Do you think Aric is trying to kill Adam via an alligator related hunting accident?”

He would say, “Yep.”

Alligators are a real conservation success story. On the verge of disappearing into the endless kiosk of designer handbags and boots, they’ve come back to threaten the safety of every poodle in the state of Florida.

Or as we like to say, “You can hardly spit around here without an alligator crawling into the damp spot. They’re everywhere.”

In Florida if there’s water, eventually, an alligator is going to crawl into it or through it on its way to a better damp spot or date. We lived on a small lake which forced us to develop the Zern Family ‘Gator Capture and Relocation Program. The program worked liked this:

1) Adam would mimic the grunt of a baby alligator (no one can grunt like my Adam.) Adam’s ‘gator grunt attracted adult alligators the way farting the alphabet attracts Cub Scouts.

2) Alligators would glide in like heat seeking missiles.

3) Aric would then flip a bit of a chicken’s inside parts, on a hook, in front of the cruising reptile (no one can fish with chicken gizzards like my Aric.) Worked every time or just about.

4) And then Aric would yell. “Adam, jump on the alligator’s back.”

After that they’d tape the ‘gator’s mouth shut, heft it in their arms, and bring it into our bedroom to show Mom and Dad. We would be napping at the time.

Another Zern family rule stated, “Never, ever bring alligators in to wake up Mommy and Daddy from their nap, because Mommy hates to wet the bed. (It’s so important to explain rules to children, don’t you think?)

At this point Sherwood would roll out of bed, muttering things.

“It’s like living in an episode of . . . flipping . . . wild . . . flipping . . . kingdom.”

Making the boys toss the alligator in the back of our truck, he’d then help them take it down the road to release it in someone else’s pond.

I would remain at home stripping sheets off the bed.

Let me shatter some alligator myths for my friends around the global water cooler. Alligators are not ambitious. If you fall into their mouths, they might take advantage of the situation. But they don’t plot.

Alligators are not like us; they are cold-blooded and the reason that they’re hanging out in the parking lot of the Winn Dixie is to get warm, not stalk you or your groceries.

Alligators are not mean. I once saw a baby alligator riding through the swamp on the nose of a gigantic Mommy alligator. How heart warming is that?

Of course, when the Mommy alligator started swimming toward us the park ranger screamed, “Run!”

Alligators are not clever. Adam and Aric outwitted them on a regular basis with a fake ‘gator call and some chicken livers.

My husband flies to Detroit, Michigan for work and takes taxi cabs from the airport to his hotel.

I asked him, “What would run across the road in front of your taxicab in Detroit?”

He said, “An out-of-work auto worker.”

Scary.

Linda (‘Gator Bait) Zern

Hot Dogs - Another Sherwood (The Traveling Man) Essay

My youngest child, Adam, got married September 8th, making my nest officially empty—not one child with my DNA living anywhere on or near my property—not in a bedroom, mother-in-law quarters, barn, or in a tent next to the Butterfly Palm in the front pasture. 

But don’t worry about me. I’m getting a dog, and I’m naming the dog Adam.

I’ve gone back to college, which means I have homework now, so while Adam’s been on his honeymoon I swept all his junk into a laundry basket and stole his desk, oh wait . . . my desk.
 Now it’s just me and my darling husband of twenty-eight years. 

Oh, and the dog named Adam—when I get it.

I just hope the dog is less gassy than my darling husband of twenty-eight years.

Sherwood travels. Sherwood travels a lot and when he travels, he tends to eat unsavory, if not downright poisonous foodstuffs—in airports, on the run, without much thought or judgment, and at his age the results can be unsavory if not downright poisonous—sometimes volcanic.

After a recent flight home, Sherwood began exhibiting the ominous rumblings and the strange expulsions of an airport dinner gone massively wrong.

“Oh my goodness, what is going on with you?” I waved a hand wildly in front of my nose.

“A Coney Island foot long hotdog.” He frowned and burped.

“What were you thinking?” I said, horrified. “A man your age should know bet . . .”



“With chili—the hotdog had chili. A foot long chili dog.”

He rolled on the bed and groaned while various noises emanated from various parts of his person.

“Whatever you ate isn’t dead yet. It’s still making sounds. How could you possibly survive two hours on an airplane in your condition?”

“The real question is, how did the other passengers survive two hours on an airplane—with me.”



I gasped for air and clawed at my chest. “You . . . did . . . not!”

“Oh I did—a lot. I let it rip; I had to or die, but I pulled a blanket over myself and pretended to be asleep. No one knew that it was me.”

Shocked by his crazed optimism, I said, “Oh they knew. Believe me, they knew. Babe, you live alone in a hotel room way too much if you think people on that airplane didn’t notice the green methane cloud hovering over your seat.”

A volcano rumbled somewhere near the place where pizza goes to die in my husband’s insides.

“I am pretty disgusting.” 



It seemed pointless to disagree with the obvious, so I smiled a crooked smile and tried not to breathe.

He lay on the bed like something washed up on the beach after a bad oil spill. Putting his hands behind his head, he rumbled and gurgled—thinking deep and meaty thoughts.

“You know what I am?”



I couldn’t imagine. The truth is, I couldn’t get enough fresh air to form a coherent thought.

“I’m a modern day mountain man.” The volcano erupted—once, twice.

I was momentarily blinded.

“You mean like one of those guys who used to live in the mountains, in caves, wrapped in animal skins, wandering around—alone—talking trash to a donkey, looking for beavers to bash on the head? That kind of mountain man?”

The volcano complained but did not erupt.

“Absolutely.”

I sighed. “And just think, now that Adam is married it’s just you and me and whatever you decide to eat on your way home.”

“That’s right.” He visibly brightened. “And that means we can run around the house naked if we want.” 


“Is that something a modern day mountain man would do, you think?”

He burped and bubbled. “Absolutely.”



“Hey, I want to be a mountain girl. Can I have a dog?”

Don’t you worry about me; I’m back in college, I’ve got a great new desk to do my homework on, and I’m getting a dog. And if life gets dark and dreary, I have my darling husband of twenty-eight years who, by all accounts, is a modern day mountain man. Top that.

Happy to be getting a dog,

Linda (Hold the Chili) Zern