The Creek

 

As far as we were concerned, The Creek began where the water found its way out of The Tunnel in the far corner of Kevin’s backyard.  The Tunnel was a long, dark, wet culvert, that was impossible to walk through without scraping your back or hitting your head on the ceiling.  And it was definitely not a place you wanted to be in a sudden rainstorm, not that the rain was ever that sudden.  We’d explore the length of The Tunnel maybe once a year, usually in the summer, when it wasn’t quite as nasty, and we wouldn’t get quite as wet, mostly so we could say that we did.  There was nothing we really wanted to find in The Tunnel.  We really wanted nothing to do with bats and ‘possums and raccoons and maybe even a skunk.  Even if we took Mark’s dog, we were never really convinced that Freckles would flush anything out, or even be concerned if she did.

 

The Tunnel came to an end one block over, on a convoluted cul-de-sac down an unnecessary hill where no kids lived.  The only way out on that end was to squeeze through the rainwater slits in the curbs, or to turn around and go back.  That’s why we mostly ignored The Tunnel and spent our time playing in The Creek.

 

The Creek was really no more than an open ditch that flowed through a few backyards before finding the street just past the Thorp’s.  We could jump over it about anywhere while it was in the backyards, but there were also a few railroad tie bridges laid across for those people who had riding lawnmowers and actually cared about cutting the grass in the back lot.

 

There, in The Creek, we would spend our days hunting crawdads.  A piece of bacon on a string worked really well.  Just lower it in the water where the crawdads are hiding under a rock and wait for them to grab onto it with their pinchers.  They were too dumb to let go when you pulled them out of the water and threw them in a bucket.  If we didn’t have any bacon, which was most of the time, we’d straddle The Creek and flip over the rocks.  The crawdads would scoot out backwards, trying to find somewhere else to hide.  If they stopped out in the open, or you were really fast, then you could grab them, right behind their pinchers.  If you missed, or if you didn’t have a good enough grip, they would pinch you.  Without hesitation.  The little crawdads didn’t hurt too bad, but the bigger ones, with the bigger pinchers and the bigger reach... they did.  And they wouldn’t let go.  Sometimes they wouldn’t even let go if their pincher broke off.  Yeah.  Nobody wanted to get pinched.

 

Sometimes we’d let the crawdads go at the end of the day, but a lot of times we took them home, especially if they had eggs tucked away under their tails.  We wanted to see if the eggs would hatch into little crawdads.  And sometimes they did.  But mostly they just died.

 

Some days we tried to build dams across The Creek.  Mud and rocks and sticks.  The best place was in the Rowan’s backyard, just down from one of the bridges.  The Creek was more narrow there, so it was easier to dam.  But it never worked.  Sure, we’d get it to back up for a while, usually until we went home at lunch.  The next time we came back the water had broken through and washed away all the mud and sticks, just leaving some of the bigger rocks behind.

 

There wasn’t any good crawdad hunting on the part of The Creek that ran along the street, and there was no point of ever trying to dam it.  Years before the city had come in an poured rough concrete over the entire stretch, from the Thorp’s to the corner.  They’d even built a retaining wall that kept the street from washing out when it rained.  In the summer we’d ride our bikes along that stretch of The Creek, and in the winter, if there were enough water and it got cold enough, we could ride our sleds on it. 

 

At the corner, The Creek ran under the street.  We called this section The Tunnel, too.  Best I can remember, nobody got overly confused about having two tunnels.  The Tunnel under the street was a little taller, but not as wide, as the other tunnel, and it only went under the street.  It was too small to ride a bike through, but on a good run you could get your sled all the way through to the other side.

 

On the other side is where The Creek changed.  It even had a different name:  The Big Creek.  It became a small pond, with trees fallen over  the far end, and mud slick banks all around, except where it came out of The Tunnel.  There it was bordered by a tall, concrete retaining wall that went about ten feet up to the street, where we would sit and stare at the water after leaving our bicycles on the side of the road.  At its fullest, The Big Creek was maybe 12 feet across, maybe 12 feet long, and maybe 4 feet deep.  Maybe.  We couldn’t see the bottom.  It was forever shrouded in silt and leaves and broken tricycles.  It was not a place anybody wanted to swim.  There were never any fish to speak of, not worth trying to catch if there were.  The most we usually did was throw big rocks in it to see who could get the biggest splash.  But, really, we usually just sat on top of the retaining wall and stared at the water.

 

Beyond The Big Creek, the stream became a bit more mysterious.  Sure, we’d walked along it all the way to Shelley Road, and even though it was still part of various people’s backyards, it was a lot more wooded, a lot more overgrown.  Unmown.  It was a challenge at times to keep close to the stream.  And beyond Shelley, it took on yet another name, a real name.  Rock Creek.  Eventually water that started in our backyards found its way to the Missouri River, and from there, everywhere.  Beyond Shelley was where Rock Creek could truly get mean.  Once, during a really heavy rain, Rock Creek flooded and actually washed a house away.  It picked it up off of its foundation and moved it downstream.  An entire house.  That was a part of the creek no one had explored.  Well, no one from our neighborhood.  We stopped at Shelley.  Truly, we stopped at the Big Creek.

 

It was at the Big Creek one summer afternoon that Mark saw a frog, its head popping up out of the water as it looked around.  This wasn’t just any frog.  It was a bullfrog, and it was big.  Within 15 minutes every kid in the neighborhood was down at The Big Creek with his BB gun.

 

Every kid had a BB gun.  Every guy.  No parent even questioned the sanity in arming every child over the age of 8 with a BB gun.  Some had guns that looked like Winchesters – the kind where you cocked the handle.  I had one that looked like an M-16.  I cocked it by pushing the barrel down and then pulling it back out again.  Mine had a bit more power than the Winchesters, but not a one of them had any accuracy whatsoever.  You’d think you had the frog dead in your sites... well, if your gun had sights... and the BB would splash several feet away.  Even if the frog got hit, the BB would just bounce off.  It got to where that frog didn’t even care that we were trying to kill it. 

 

When we were about to give up, maybe go home and get some of Davey’s M-80s, the frog went under.  Usually when it went under, it just sort of slid beneath the surface.  But this was different.  It was sudden.  And it went straight down.  And then it popped right back up.  This was different, too.  Instead of hanging solid in the water, it just bobbed around.  Something was wrong.  So we got a stick and was able to poke the frog.  Instead of swimming away, it just rolled over.  The entire bottom half of that large bullfrog was missing.  Gone.  Before any of us could say, “Holy Shit!” a snapping turtle surfaced in the middle of The Big Creek.  A very large snapping turtle.  It was an Alligator Snapping Turtle.  Macrochelys temmincki.  The largest species of snapping turtle in North America.  That one probably wasn’t the largest one, but it was bigger than any turtle any of us had ever seen, short of National Geographic specials.  If you’ve never seen a picture of an alligator snapper, they look prehistoric.  There are ridges on its shell that extend right down its tail.  Its mouth ends in a vicious beak.  It has long claws on each webbed toe, and they’re not for digging.  This is not a turtle that’s going to hide in its shell if you try to pick it up.  And there it was, floating in the middle of the creek with frog on its breath.  So we decided to catch it.  I’m not sure if it were an endangered species then.  It is now.  I’m not sure it would’ve mattered.  We weren’t wanting to kill it.  We just wanted to catch it.  And we did... well, sort of.

 

It took us the rest of the afternoon, but, using sticks, we finally herded that very large turtle into the shallow end of the creek.  It was only there, in the soft mud, that we realized just how big that turtle was.  Its shell was easily two foot across, and at least two feet long.  It had to have weighed 100 pounds, and that was probably on the light side.

 

If you’re ever wanting to pick up a snapping turtle, you do it by the tail.  If you try to pick it up by the shell, it can flip its head around and snap you, or it can rip your hand with those sharp claws... or both.  But if you pick it up by the tail – assuming the turtle lets you even get that close – and you hold it out far enough from your body, you can actually move that turtle from one place to another without getting maimed.  Mind you, we were just kids.  Davey was probably the strongest one in the lot, but even he couldn’t pick up a 100 pound-plus turtle, much less hold it at a safe distance.

 

It was about then that the turtle swung around and bit the branch that Mark was holding clean in two.  And fast.  Turtles were supposed to be slow, but this one wasn’t.  And it wasn’t a half rotten branch.  This was a stick about three inches across, about twice the width of a broom handle.  Solid.  And that turtle snapped it in two like it was nothing.

 

It was then that we re-evaluated just what it was we were trying to do with an animal that was capable of removing body parts – easily.  And quickly.  This was not something that was ever going to make a good pet.  Or a bad one, as far as that goes.  It was not something we could really keep – anywhere.  Not that it mattered.  It wasn’t going anywhere that it already didn’t want to go.  And it did not want to go with us.

 

So we got the hell out of there.  We hurriedly retreated to the top of the retaining wall, where that turtle certainly couldn’t get us, or at least we’d have time to get away if it tried.  And there we watched as that turtle slowly slid back into the water.  It hung on the surface for a few minutes, with its nose and all those spikes on its shell sticking out, before it slowly sank all the way under.  When it became obvious that it wasn’t coming back up anytime soon, we each picked up our bicycles and slowly pedaled home.

 

After that we went down to The Big Creek like usual.  We’d sit up on the retaining wall and stare at the water like we always did.  But we never saw that turtle again.  I wonder if it made it all the way to the Missouri.

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