Turtle Crossing 6/10/12

"And over the grass at the roadside a land turtle crawled, turning aside for nothing, dragging his high-domed shell over the grass.  His hard legs and yellow-nailed feet threshed slowly through the grass, not really walking, but boosting and dragging his shell along. the barley beards slid off his shell, and the clover burrs fell on him and rolled to the ground. His horny beak was partly open, and his fierce, humorous eyes, under brows like fingernails, stared straight ahead. He came over the grass leaving a beaten trail behind him, and the hill, which was the highway embankment, reared up ahead of him. For a moment he stopped, his head held high. He blinked and looked up and down. At last he started to climb the embankment. Front clawed feet reached forward but did not touch. The hind feet kicked his shell along, and it scraped on the grass, and on the gravel. As the embankment grew steeper and steeper, the more frantic were the efforts of the land turtle. Pushing hind legs strained and slipped, boosting the shell along, and the horny head protruded as far as the neck could stretch. Little by little the shell slid up the embankment until at last a parapet cut straight across its line of march, the shoulder of the road, a concrete wall four inches high. As though they worked independently the hind legs pushed the shell against the wall. The head upraised and peered over the wall to the broad smooth plain of cement. Now the hand, braced on top of the wall, strained and lifted, and the shell came slowly up and rested its front end on the wall. For a moment the turtle rested."   The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck


For those of you motoring on The Mother Road, please be aware of these land turtles.  We counted at least nine of the "high-domed shells" on the pavement in Missouri, Kansas, and Oklahoma, and like the forty-year old woman driving the sedan in Steinbeck's classic, at times we swerved to avoid these humorous eyes who have as much right to the road as we do. We're happy to report that all that we saw were happily pushing their shells across the road.  Not so for the poor dozen armadillos spotted along the road. Life can be hard for creatures on the Mother Road.


Happy trails, S