You Always Need to Watch Your Step

A few weeks ago, it was just after dark and I had opened some boxes from items I had ordered, and decided to take the empty boxes out to the porch to dispose of them the following day. I had the boxes in one hand, flipped on the light switch to the porch and opened the door. I was wearing shorts and barefoot as always, and as I proceeded through the opening and started to take my first step onto the rug just outside the door, I caught some movement out of the corner of my eye. The movement was on the rug where I was about to step. I then stepped over this area and onto the bare wood just out past the rug.

As I made that first long step over the rug and onto the porch, I turned to see what I had caught a glimpse of. To my surprise, there was a 3-foot long rattlesnake coiled up on the rug exactly where I was about to step. After I had made it past the reptile, it slithered off to a corner of the porch just a few feet away. He had no way out.

I yelled at Ellen and she handed me a mop to hold the snake down. She then found a crowbar in the garage for me to kill the snake. I held the critter down with the mop and mashed his head in, killing him instantly. I have seen rattlesnakes in the swamp before, but they are rare here. They like dryer areas. Though the drought here is not nearly as bad, it is still dry here in the river bottom. Maybe there will be more rattlesnakes in my future. I will need to keep my eyes open. You just never know where they are going to show up—maybe at your doorstep one night!

It made a nice hatband!