If you see red eyes above the water line . . .

 

Sometimes God makes me chuckle—like now, when I think back to what a prim and proper young lady I was when I landed in Lomalinda. And when I recall what a protected, comfortable suburban life I’d led until then. And how God sent me there, planning to awaken me to altogether new ways of thinking and living.

 

I think back to what God seemed to say when He finally—finally!—convinced me to move to Lomalinda.

 

You see, a lot of people, especially my mother, had expected me to color within life’s lines—and that had been my plan, too.

 

But instead, I sensed God saying, with a big grin, “Color outside the lines, and don’t even think about using pastel colors. Use exotic, pulsing, dancing colors, shimmering, out-of-this-world colors.” (Chapter 2, Please, God, Don’t Make Me Go: A Foot-Dragger’s Memoir)

 

Getting acquainted with Lomalinda’s wildlife—and the people who enjoyed those creatures—offered me opportunities to color outside the lines. Believe me, there was nothing like it in Seattle!

 

I’ve already told you about bulls that roamed through Lomalinda, coming right up to my kitchen window and eating my hibiscus, and about the parrots that shared our neighborhood with us.

 

I’ve told you about swimming with stingrays—and with piranhas. And with anacondas.

 

And I’ve told you a story you won’t soon forget about my friend Mardty and a boa constrictor. And another story about a boa constrictor’s smile.

 

Today I want to tell you how we humans also shared our territory with caimans, related to both alligators and crocodiles.

 

Caimans open their jaws “aggressively,” and “seize their prey and drag it underwater to drown it” (Wikipedia).

 

Lomalindians hunted caimans in the lake,

its outlet, and swampy areas.

And what stories they could tell!

 

We heard that one of the men brought home a baby caiman late at night and put it in the bathtub—much to his wife’s dismay when she got up in the night to use the bathroom.

 

Another young man invited a girl to go caiman-hunting on their first date and, believe it or not, she later married him.

 

Sometimes Lomalindians initiated newcomers by taking them on a caiman hunt and telling them tall tales—exaggerating a bit to terrify them.

 

While a few adults hunted caiman, teens had more wild-eyed stories to tell, and they now admit their mothers would’ve had a conniption if they’d known what their kids had been up to.

 

It seemed that the teens went hunting after dark when their parents thought they were doing homework with friends. Others confess they snuck out after bedtime.

 

Sometimes they set out in a canoe, but other times they waded into the water, often barefooted--! Their tools of the trade were a .22 rifle, or sometimes a machete or bow and arrow, as well as a flashlight, which helped spot the caiman’s red eyes above the waterline. When the kids saw the red, they aimed and shot between the eyes.

 

Russ Meehan tells a story about wading through a swamp when he and his friends spotted a caiman nearly four feet long. Russ wrote,

 

“I was getting up my nerve to hack it with a machete when Rick yelled, ‘No, wait!’ He wanted to grab it by the neck.

 

“I watched as he began clearing debris away. Then he plunged his hand down on the neck and pulled up. The caiman began thrashing, and it was too much for Rick, who had to let go.

 

Russ continued, “It landed in the water and began running on top of the pond with Rick chasing it from behind.

 

“Then Benny, who had a pistol with him, began firing at the fleeing caiman!

 

“Later I heard Benny say, ‘That boy is crazy, chasing a caiman like that,’ and I heard Rick say, ‘That guy is crazy, shooting a gun like that; he could have killed me!’”

 

Jim Wheeler, one of my husband’s students, still talks about a friend who brought home a baby caiman—which his mom flushed down the toilet. A few months later when the family had plumbing problems, they dug up the septic tank and found a five-foot-long caiman.

 

Jim also tells this story of hunting with a .22 rifle and flashlight, shining it over the water, searching for red eyes, the wider the gap between them the bigger the caiman.

 

Jim says, “David Mansen and I were at one of the marshy ponds at night. We spotted red eyes that looked at least four inches apart—so it was a big one.

 

“David fired the rifle. We heard a splash, then quiet. Now what?”

 

While you keep reading, below, keep in mind that caimans “may observe a potential prey, swim away, submerge, and return to attack” (Wikipedia).

 

“David, you shot it,” I said. “You go find it.” He waded into the knee-deep water while I stayed about ten feet behind, holding the flashlight.

 

“Several feet before the place we’d seen the caiman, David started slicing his machete through the murky water to locate the hopefully dead beast. After several minutes, he connected with his trophy—a sixteen-inch baby caiman.

 

“After getting over our disappointment, neither of us said much.

 

“This isn’t the one we saw earlier.

This is just a baby.

Big mama is still around somewhere. 

Let’s get out of here!”