I was just sitting here after a good lunch and my mind wandered off to a special part of my past. His name was Lancelot. He was a striking lad with beautiful brown eyes that could watch two different things at the same time. He would often gaze at me as I worked on a computer. He also loved to look out the window at bugs flying by. He'd sit in the sunshine there and occasionally tilt his head to regard me with that quiet demeanor of his.
He was enchanting. And fast. When he was so inclined, of course. His food did not stand a chance - he loved his food, I remember that.
Over the years since he died I've come to think of him less and less. When his image does fill my mind, however, it is just as vivid as it was when he was right there in front of me. I can still see the tilt of his head, the way his eyes would look through mine and into my soul. I can feel his skin on mine. I remember how bright he was when he was happy, and how dull he'd get when something wasn't right. I remember the time he ate that spider off the curtain and grinned broadly at me, a twinkle in his eye, licking his chops.
I remember when he hid in the curtains for a week, and wouldn't take any water. I remember how he also hid in my stack of papers, and behind my stereo, and how I bred crickets just for him. I felt some affinity towards an albino cricket and took it aside. I named it Jiminy. Jiminy lived in the bathroom for three months. I set food and water out for him. Lancelot did not approve of that, methinks, but he never said anything about it. He only gazed at me, as if he was just as entranced by me as I was with him.
How many people can say that they befriended a 5-inch-long green anole and let him roam all over the downstairs of their apartment, eating bugs and clinging to curtains and circuit boards?
That, I say, is something I've done that is freakin' cool.
~w
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