One of my biggest fears in moving to Orlando was the gators. No, seriously. I pictured gators everywhere. In the lakes. Crawling out of drainage pipes. Eating my dog. We had friends who had a gator in their garage. They don’t even live near water. Basically I thought we were moving to an episode of Swamp People.
I was wary, the first few times I ran around our neighborhood. I tiptoed on the dock. I made wide berths around puddles and swampy looking water. I was suspicious of large bushes.
But six months passed and no sign of gators. I think I heard some in the reeds one night at the lake, if gators make a sound something like a pig. So either gators or water pigs was what I heard. But no sightings.
I started to get a little disappointed, nay, a lot disappointed. I was told there’d be gators. When I mentioned this gatorless existence on Facebook, people suggested I had not been leaving my house, and I simply needed to look harder.
So I’ve looked. I look at every body of water I pass. I squint into swampy places. It’s not that this area lacks wildlife. I’ve seen deer, armadillo, otters, sand cranes, and more vultures than I care to count. I had almost given up hope.
And then today, I’m pretty sure I saw one. It was on the left side of the road, probably 50 feet from the street, sunning itself on the side of a lake (I use the term lake generously). Finally! I think I was starting to get a complex, an “everyone’s seen a gator but me what am I doing wrong?” complex. No more! I now believe there are gators in Orlando.
How long will it be until I am no longer excited to see gators? Probably when I see one in my garage. Definitely if they eat my dog.
Haha, too funny! That reminds me of when we were planning our move to Arizona six years ago. I was afraid of rattlesnakes in much the way you feared gators. After moving here, I learned that in the subdivisions, you really don't have to worry about rattlesnakes. I've seen a few from the safety of our minivan and behind the glass at the nature center. We do have friends who go out into the desert on purpose to find and kill rattlesnakes for fun. Go figure. I, on the other hand, am quite content to not have any out of the vehicle experiences with the things. So far, so good…