Dinosaur Buddha
I knew my neighbors lived in a very different world than I did from the day they moved in across the street from me. I was working out in the wood yard as the trucks pulled up and welcomed them with a wave. Annie came over with a bottle of wine that very morning to ask that I not split wood when her husband was home. With a nudge and conspiratorial wink, she said she didn’t want him to be aware that women could, or would, do that kind of work.
I fell in love immediately with their son Jake, who was a precocious, curious eight-year-old with bright red hair. Developing a tolerance for Allen, the arrogant father, took more diligence. He was a macho shithead, but eventually put decent effort into being civilized around me because he wanted to rent space in my barn for his shadetree mechanic operation. The rest of the family were Arnold, a large pet pig, and Skippy, a tortoise about the size of a half-grapefruit.
Pigs are as intelligent and social as dogs are. Arnold was the first I’d known and he was delightful. He used a litter box and loved treats and scratches behind the ear. He and Jake would come over for frequent visits I enjoyed immensely.
Allen was a hunter, so the carcass I saw hanging in the barn six months or so later wasn’t the first. Allen was working at the bench as I went out to sort the recycling in my remaining corner of the barn. I grew up in a hunting family and conversationally asked after the season. I didn’t know of any tags issued in the dead of winter.
“Oh, there’s no season right now. That’s Arnold. Annie wants to know if you want to come over for a pork roast dinner tonight.”
My mouth turned to sawdust I gagged on.
“Oh, no, thanks . . .” I stammered and stumbled, stunned, “I, uh. . I, uh, I have a paper due tomorrow and I, . . . have to study tonight.”
“Oh, okay. You want me to bring you a plate or some leftovers?”
“No, n-n-no thank you. I . . . need to finish some beef stew that’s getting dated.”
I had been taking care of their pets when they were away from the start. Pet, now, singular. I had adored Arnold and was enchanted with Skippy. Skippy was downstream of the dinosaurs, a surviving remnant of the once-powerful reptilian race. Skippy’s people, having survived the catastrophe they did, took a long view of things. She knew how to tuck it in, be still, and wait it out. She wasn’t overly burdened with brainpower, but I found her charming. She lived in a cat carrier about a foot by two feet that was kept none too clean. I made Skippy’s little prison as clean and comfortable as possible on my watch, but she dearly loved to get out of it. I would take her outside to let her play in the dirt when it was warm enough, which she enjoyed immensely.
Skippy came to my family the day Annie called to ask if I’d like to come over that evening for turtle soup. I ran across the street as fast as I could. I didn’t bother with the cat carrier, I stuffed Skippy in my jacket pocket, and brought her home.
My roommate’s dog, Chaco, was even more enchanted with Skippy than I was. He sat in front of her terrarium, smitten. We moved it downstairs so he could whine his rapture for her somewhere other than my bedroom all night. He was always very tender with Skippy, taking her gently in his mouth. But taking her with nonetheless if he could. Most often we found her in Chaco’s bed, but he buried her in the garden twice. Scared the bejeebers out of my roommate and I, but Skippy loved it. Chaco would graciously show us 
where he’d buried the treasure, and we’d find Skippy, happily dirty, digging out.
I built Skippy increasingly larger and more elaborate terrariums over the years, but she preferred a sunny corner in my office to any of them. She liked leafy greens and, if I chopped them fine enough, carrots. She’d get in the dog food if she got a chance at it. Her melons she preferred cut in half. She loved to wallow in them.
Skippy’s people are long-lived and I was committed for the duration with her. I had spoken with my niece about carrying on after me, but even with a nice terrarium and an obliging dog to bury you in the garden every once in a while, ninety years in the box is a long time. I felt mean-spirited and greedy for sentencing her to it and in the end, found a tortoise sanctuary for her down in the desert. I surrendered her to a place where she could live outside in her beloved dirt, and maybe even find a boyfriend to make some little Skippys with.
It was enough for Skippy just to be, and in that regard, she was an incredibly powerful and liberating Buddha for me to be in the presence of. Skippy could be still in a way that was alien and fascinating to me. Stillness is not in my nature. When Skippy wasn’t ready to come inside, she’d tuck it in, hunker down, and become a rock. She could vanish against her background completely.
Skippy’s superpower was the ability to wait it out. It didn’t bother her that my cats liked to play field hockey with her on the hardwood floor. She’s poke her head and legs out when they inevitably tired of their game, and amble on in her slow, methodical way in search of a sunny corner or an overlooked morsel of kibble.
It suited my frenetic nature that I was raised to be my work. Waking stillness was laziness in my Protestant work ethic family. I was taught that what I did mattered more than who I was. That I was the sum of my accomplishments. I was a frenzied workaholic. Skippy taught me that the panic, and the crisis that caused it, will likely pass if you just tuck it in and wait it out.
Even old and broken down as I am now, my frantic drive sometimes still exhausts me. When it does, I go out into the woods and sit down in the company of a rock about the size of a half-grapefruit and channel my inner Skippy. We sit together and just be, and it is enough. I am enough. The agitated, insufferable do-gooder who is so driv
en to avert the suicidal catastrophe my species seems bent on committing inevitably returns. But for those few minutes I’m in communion with my Skippyrock, I don’t have to save the world, I can just be in it. I can take the long view, tuck in, and hunker down. Wait it out. Maybe get dirty. And for those few peaceful minutes it doesn’t matter how much money I made or what my grades were or if the corners met perfectly in my quilt. The political insanity of my species doesn’t torture me and I don’t feel like Henny Penny shouting and flapping that the sky is falling. What momentary respite I get from it is courtesy of a tiny little dinosaur, about the size of a half-grapefruit.
Other Resources
| author | Terryl Warnock |
| On Internet | tortoise resources |
| NPR news story | tortoise rescue |
Not all the best teachers in life are to be found in human educational institutions. You can learn a lot from a little tortoise, about the size of a half-grapefruit.
Buddha, although he would be elevated to the status of religious avatar by the cultures he influenced, was neither god nor prophet. He was a teacher. A powerful guru. Buddhism is a nontheistic religion (not to be confused with atheism). Atheism states that there is no god (See Me and My Shepherd). Buddha recognized that hell is here and he imparts to the faithful how to let go of the things they’re clinging to that are making them miserable in this lifetime. Buddha, like Skippy, teaches how to find peace and stillness in life’s crazy clanging busy-ness. These powerful gurus show us how to be human beings rather than human doings.
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Some images are through Creative Commons License and we would thank all of those creators if we could find their names.
Terryl is grateful most of all to Skippy. She was a wonderful friend, and hard to let go of. She was one of Terryl’s great teachers. Skippy would be about 30 now, and it is hoped that she has a happy life and a bunch of little Skippys to carry on her educational legacy.
Terryl is always grateful to the Life in Pieces writing circle, who read an early draft of this, and of course, to AL, without whom nobody but me would ever read this stuff.
AL and Terryl are both very grateful, always, to the people who read our work. You are what makes it worthwhile.
Terryl Warnock is an eccentric with a happy heart who lives on the outskirts of town with her cat. She is known as an essayist, proof reader, editor, maker of soap, and proud pagan. A lifetime student, she has pursued science, religion, and sustainable communities. This, plus life experience from the local community service to ski instructor, from forest service worker to DMV supervisor, from hospitality to business owner gives her a broad view on the world.
Terryl is the author of:The Miracle du jour, ISBN-10: 0989469859, ISBN-13 : 978-0-9894698-5-2
AJ Brown, in a past life, was an embedded systems engineer (digital design engineer). He worked on new product designs from hard disk controllers, communication protocols, and link encryptors to battery monitors for electric cars.
A few years ago he surrendered his spot on the freeway to someone else. Now he is more interested in sailing, building out his live-in bus for travel, and supporting the idea of full-circle food: the propagation, growth, harvest, storage, preparation, and preservation of healthy sustenance. He is a strong supporter of Free/Libre Open Source Software[F/LOSS] and is willing to help most anyone in their quest to use it.
Together, we are MoonLit Press.