Tale of the Armadillo: origins

Years ago...

... small grey claws scratch the asphalt of north Texas.  The small form watches as a storm passes over the savanna miles away and disappears over the horizon.  The brief flashes of lightning reflect off of his dark eyes.  His ears twitch to the sound of a passing scissor tail, and when silence settles he takes his first tentative steps across the road.  At the edge, he turns left and aims himself toward the growing dark.

I was in good company in those days.  Smith, Zimmerman, Meeks, and Falzarano were a new family under the stripes and thunderclap of the U.S. Air Force.  We were an inseparable group of adventurers brought together without our will, but thankful all the same.  In those days, we worked and then we ranged the Texas we found ourselves a part of.  Like Edward Abbey, I wanted to see the country I had sworn to defend.  And like Abbey, I wanted to see it up close, warts and all.

We made a list.  In the back of class, during the down time, we set down on paper the things we wanted.  A list of demands if you will.  In the course of our time there, we achieved everything... almost.  We never did get our hands on a stuffed armadillo.  

We could have bought one.  Anyone can.  There seem to be quite a few taxidermists who will mount an armadillo, and if you have a few hundred bucks, you can own one.  But that is no way to hunt armadillos.  Not for us:  we needed a story to go with everything.  

Cowboy hats from our first rodeo.  Compact discs which had become the soundtrack to our road trips.  A poster from the Buddy Holly Symposium.  Pint glasses from benders and ash trays from cheap hotels.  All of it the evidence of our travels, and all of it loaded with the legend of our time in Texas.  The armadillo, though, escaped our grasp.  

In the years since, I made it a symbol.  It became the mark of how I look at the world: a place of immense possibility.  A place where the adventurer will always come away with a treasure, if not the one they seek.  Because everyone has a story, it only needs to be told.