Raymond Approves

I was here alone yesterday afternoon, carrying in groceries from the store. As I would walk in from the carport I would pause to listen to my chimes. They were all tingling so lightly and giving me such a sense of peace.

I paused to put away some of the frozen food and noticed that all the turtles (16) were being quite noisy. As I started looking around at all of them, it came to me that I had lost my mind.

Why on earth did I ever agree to allow all these turtles to inhabit my kitchen and living room? Me! The woman that used to believe everything has its own place, and everything belonged in its place. I was the one that used to say the kitchen was my room and everything in the kitchen belonged to me. It was the one room that everything in it was there because I placed it there.

Now there is a 75 gallon turtle tank and a small 3 gallon turtle tank in my kitchen. There is a huge eight foot by almost 3 foot turtle table in my living room, along with two twenty gallon turtle tanks.

Turtles smell. My youngest keeps the tanks clean, but they smell. Especially musk turtles and snapping turtles and I have them right in the door as you enter my living room.

As I was carrying the last of the groceries in I started analyzing having so many turtles. I was wondering if I was doing the right thing by allowing my youngest to explore his love of turtles. I was questioning whether or not I was letting my youngest have all these turtles because I was trying to give him something to smother with love since his father wasn’t here to be smothered in love. Was it alright for my son to have all these turtles? Was it good for me to allow so much space to be dedicated to turtles?

Then it happened. The wind bell, which has been silent since the last time I felt Raymond send me a message, started clanging. It went crazy. While the other chimes were gently tinkling, the wind bell was moving violently around in its space. I stopped to watch. I listened to it clang, and said “okay, I get it.” The wind bell stopped.

I came in and sat down thinking about the turtles and Raymond. When Raymond was alive we had three turtles. They were located in the kitchen. A musk hatchling on the counter in a small tank, and two sliders in a 20 gallon tank along the wall. Raymond would often wheel up to the bigger tank and watch the turtles and talk to them. The hatchling came after he was bedridden, but we showed it to him. He enjoyed talking to the turtles and watching them. He was fascinated by our son’s interest in learning about the turtles.

No, I am not doing the wrong thing. Yes, it is a lot of turtles, and we will be getting number 17 today, a rescue turtle. We have agreed he will be our last, but I doubt it. We love all of our turtles; they are part of the family. They are not a love replacement for any of us, they are our pets

Raymond approves.