hey

You know its funny how long it takes someone to accecpt the fact that if you want to do something you need to do it or just hope it happens. Well, instead of telling people about my writing I will just post it.


Lleaping for Llamas


I was going through some papers, you know the ones that you want to save but in the back of your mind know that they should have been tossed about five years ago. Pulling out a crayon drawing of a man with a cape and twin ells on his chest, I smiled. How a poorly drawn picture is able to bring back such vivid memories, but more than memories, life changing events, one that made a mild (and slightly crazy) mannered man into a super hero, but not just any super hero, Llama Man! Defender of small children and exotic animals! I sat down on my couch and laughed out loud, this was one of those insane chain of potentially dangerous events that in the end turned all the players into hero’s that to this day are still talked about, (most likely as in, I knew this idiot once).
My girlfriend (at that time) her daughter and I had pulled up stakes in Vermont and headed back to my Home State of Maine. Not only did we come with a lot of furniture; we came with two horses, two Llamas and a dog (a potential traveling road show to say the least). We were lucky enough to find a farmhouse in the small town of busted had land and room enough for all. She immediately found a good job at a petting farm (I was thrilled to have more animals). I set right to work fixing up the barn, building fences; you know the general things you do when you seem to be collecting animals for the ark. And coincidences of coincidences the owner of the zoo had a Llama as well! Susan (name changed to protect the innocent) while in Vermont, had created a business called Llunch with a Llama. Now it may sound odd but people loved to have her take them out hike around and eat peanut butter and fluff sandwiches. After all at this point llamas were a rare thing to see In Vermont, and to go back to Connecticut and tell your fellow workers that you indeed did have a peanut butter and fluff sandwich in Vermont with a llama (we took pictures for proof). Was the ultimate in cubical one-ups-man ship. She decided it was time to expand, she would take in the zoo’s (six foot four, four hundred pound!) llama, named Pasta, and teach him to walk around and dine with out of starters. Our llamas…..Roy and Fred (Names are changed as well, they were innocent…. Pasta was defiantly not!) were happily grazing in the field (that I had just put an electric fence around) When Pasta arrived. He was big, strong and just a wee bit skittish (That should have been my first hint) but we put him in with the others and he seemed happy. It was at this point that his owner looked at me and said. “ You know Pasta has never been near an electric fence before.” I responded confidently.

“ Don’t worry, our boys have never gotten out.” Now, looking back on those few words we spoke I just can’t understand why I didn’t just say, “ Really, well load that beast back in the truck before it destroys this quaint little town!” But I didn’t and he left shaking his head (or laughing).
Susan and I watched the three frolic in the sun for a while then decided to go in (lord knows we neglect the two pot bellied pigs, the baby kangaroo and the now two dogs!) and relax for a while. I will say this, if you haven’t noticed Mother Nature has a sense of humor, and she was feeling her oats that day. I looked out the window not a half hour after going in and it was dark as night, then it started haling, then there was a loud clap of thunder, then a loud scream and a car horn. I was sitting around in shorts and a tank top and we were talking about (oddly enough) how we would meet our new neighbors. We leaped out the door and saw our two llamas but no Pasta. I immediately threw on my boots and went to the barn cursing the hale as it pelted me, grabbed a halter and some rope and ran to where there was a stopped car. The woman inside was fine, she looked a little shaky, but good. For a woman who had never even heard of a llama never the less had one jump in front of her in the middle of a freak storm and spit on her windshield (quite a trooper in my book). I asked her if she was all-right, she just looked at me as if to say, well nothing she just looked at me. I turned and started down the road in hot pursuit, If you have ever had the wonderful opportunity of chasing a llama, then you know they are fast. If you ever had the chance of chasing a pure white one in the middle of a hailstorm…they are fast and hard to see. The only thing at this point (which was to neither of our advantages) that leveled the playing field was that we didn’t know the area (But that would soon change). As I was running a horn sounded once more, I turned to see Susan in a car, with a closer look I saw the very woman that was only minutes ago speechless (our first new friend). She was still in a daze and probably figured that she should listen to Susan and escape with the first opportunity. Susan yelled out the window that they would drive ahead and cut Pasta off, good idea, but then again it’s only in the movies that when being chased by a car you stay directly in front of it, and of course this only applies to humans! First stop. Town graveyard, (forgive me father for I have sinned). Hooves and soft earth don’t mix well, add a few headstones and you have a veritable maze of marble and granite posts on ice. The first to loose grip was Pasta, careening into a headstone; I was so horrified that I tried to stop and took out another. It was terrible, Pasta kept darting in and out of the stones, by the time we exited out the other side it looked as though some insane pilot had landed a seven-forty-seven in the place (I saw a lot of church in my future). Susan had exited the car by now and released our friend to speed away, and was running down the road towards Pasta. It was the next incident that made us move within a week of this happening. Pasta ran through another fence, this was bad enough, but helplessly watching the twenty head of cattle, three horses and a goat run through the other side to reek havoc on the rest of the town. Made me just want to turn and run, pack and drive. Susan ran into the now (so we thought) empty field and I hit the road, running for all I was worth yelling Pasta! Pasta! At the top of my lungs. I could only imaging what the neighbors thought of the new people in town.
“ Hey Martha! Come over here!”
What?”
“ Quick! Stay away from the window, he might see you.”
“ Is he yelling a recipe?
“ Lock the doors…I’m getting the gun!”

I actually started laughing, here I am in the middle of a storm, big clunky boots, tank top, shorts, covered in mud, and carrying ropes, yelling pasta. There was nothing else to do but laugh. Then it struck me, I had heard that there were cattle up the road, and what else? I was looking at Susan running through the field when it hit me with such a force it almost made me fall. “ Susan! Bull! Bull!”
“ What!” She yelled.
“ Bull! There’s a bull in the field!”
“ Fool in the field!”
“ No Bull in the field!” How the hell she get fool in the field? “ Get out of there!
“ I almost…” Not another word was said as I watched in amazement as she realized what I was yelling. She made a dash that would have made flash proud.
“ Where’s Pasta.” She said out of breath, like running from bulls is a common thing.
“ He’s stopped over there.” I pointed to Pasta just hanging out in the farmer’s driveway. I couldn’t help but take a quick peek at the house behind us, knowing that they were still watching.
“ Martha, now there’s two of them.”
“ I’ll get another box of shells deah.”
Slowly, painfully slowly I made my way to Pasta; I was about to grab him when the owner came running from around the house yelling. “ Out they are all out!” For some reason this scarred Pasta and the chase was on again.
Luck was on our side this time, llamas like many things, they are smart and very inquisitive, but they especially like dogs, and even more small dogs. To our benefit there was a small dog about a half-mile down the road chained to a post, and Pasta heard and found the little pooch. Susan was the first on the scene; Pasta was towering over a now scarred quiet poodle. All jumped when the dogs owner burst out of the door, terrified, not knowing what really to do, and in his boxer shorts. If that wasn’t enough humiliation for one day, Susan (always the professional) tells the guy that llamas like dogs (I know he was thinking, for what, Lunch). She instructed him to hold his arms up like he was a fence and wave them slightly (It is a well known fact that a mostly naked man waving his arms will stop a four-hundred pound llama) This would give her a chance to get Pasta. I was on my way over and realized that Pasta would know what I was coming for, Then I saw it (This is where you meet my sidekick...Alpaca guy) a school bus, My neighbor’s bus. I waved down the bus full of fifth graders and it stopped and the doors flew open to reveal a slightly amused Joe (Not really Joe and you know why).
“ I have a slight problem.”
“ It seems to look like that.” Joe laughed. “ How can I help?”
“ See Susan and the naked guy?” I pointed.
“ Yea, is that one of yours?” He saw Pasta.
“ I’ll explain later, I need you to drive up slowly so I can get Pasta.”
“ Are you serious?”
“ Yes Joe, unfortunately I am.”
“ Jump in.”
“ Great.” I boarded the buss and turned to see it full of kids, kids who were dead silent at the sight of this dirty rope toting thing looking back at them. I just sighed and turned looking through the window. “ Joe…after that llama!” To both of our delights every kid on that buss leaped up and cheered at the top of their lungs. Joe slammed the door closed and jammed the llama mobile into first. Now kids, especially young ones like to make up songs, and this was no different. For a half-mile we heard “ We’re on a llama hunt…. We’re on a llama hunt, all in unison.
“ Should I pull up like I’m letting kids off?” Joe asked seriously.
“ Yes.” It wasn’t like Pasta was going to go, hey here comes the…. Wait a minute this is a trick.
“ Here we go.” Joe started to slow. I turned and all went silent in a somewhat petrified awe, to be honest I did feel a little like a super hero, dozens of little eyes on me waiting for me to take on the evil Pasta. We stopped and the door slowly slid open, there was slight murmuring from the kids as I stepped calmly and slowly from the bus. Susan couldn’t believe it; naked boy stopped waving his arms and somewhere off in the distance the hooves of a runaway horse could be heard. I was the one, I was going to bring this llama down, Pasta looked at me, I at Pasta and he bolted. No way! You are mine! I ran along the side of the bus to cut him off. I hadn’t noticed but all the kids had their heads out the window and started yelling.
“ Go llama! Go llama!” I dove (For the kids man! Do it for the Kids!) Kids screamed, Susan gasped, naked boy picked up his dog and ran like hell, and I got him. Pasta kicked whined spit and I struggled swore (Sorry mom) and yelled, finally we came crashing to the ground, tired dirty and sore, I had won. Not only had I defeated the evil Pasta, I gave a busload of small children (and the now famous Alllpaaaacaaaa! Guuuuuyyyyy!) A story that no one would believe unless they were there.
After vet bills, apologies, promises to leave town, all was once again quiet in our little part of the world. Susan’s daughter came home and smiled she was the most popular kid in school, (after all how many kids live with a super hero) she handed me a stack of drawings, of a man in a cape with two ells on his chest flying through the air. As for Joe, he is the most popular bus driver ever at the school, I think kids feel that there’s a better chance of running into exotic animals when he’s driving. Naked boy, well, He has taken to wearing clothes when his dog is tied out, and me, I don’t really care for llamas that much, but somewhere deep inside llama man still exists. Besides I have friend that raises Emu’s, you never know, they say super heroes never really retire.