The Tortoise Lifestyle

Four days after getting home, I'm already back into the tortoise-walking routine. Wake up at 10:30, take a 20-minute shower, eat a bowl of Quaker Oat Squares topped with my mother's famous fruit salad, take out the tortoise.

As Tony persistently presses over the lawn in a preordained direction, I lounge on the front porch or deck stairway and catch up on backlogged Smithsonians and National Geographics, or read up on Petrov's Defense (e4 e5, nf3 nf6, nf3xe5 ...). Maybe last night's storm with straight-line winds tossed wood chips from the neighbor's bed into our yard, and I'll rake them into tidy piles. Or the occasional passerby on foot or wheel might stop and marvel at Tony as he nears the street, and I'll act out the role of docent.

There were a few good articles in July's Smithsonian. Sometime approximately five or seven thousand years ago there lived a common descendant of every human being on Earth, alongside a slew of uncommon descendents. Edward Hopper's first artistic success didn't come until he was into his 40s. But after the triumph of his Cape Ann watercolors in 1924, recognition and fame were forthcoming, and a Hopper retrospective was mounted at the MOMA in 1931. August's National Geographic claims that 0.13 milliseconds is all the time needed for the trap-jaw ant to accelerate its jaws from zero to 143 miles per hour, a reflex often used to spring the ant off the body of a predator. A nice map of Central America also came with that issue, but unless one discounts Asia's topography, the factoid, "Mexico: So mountainous, if flattened it would cover Asia," is patently false.

Serene like Hopper's "Cape Cod Afternoon"

Tony is constantly refining his tastes. Today, he wasn't fond of the purple flowers in the front pine grove. Those are usually a staple of his diet. Of course, his system could also be clogged, much to my detriment in the near future.

When I come down into the kitchen sometime around 11, Tony is out on the deck, violently pacing near the guard rail banisters. He pauses in midstep when I open the screen door and tentatively reorients himself toward me, expecting my crane-like arms to hoist him into flight and shuttle him onto the yard below.

A low, rotting plank of wood lies across the top of the stairs to prevent Tony from tumbling off. I quickly hop this obstacle, catching my heel on the half foot of deck behind it, and taking the first flight of steps two at a time. It is paramount to keep Tony level while holding him aloft, because his heavy back end might let loose a nice present if it is tipped back too markedly.

I make sure Tony finishes an aerial stride before depositing him on the back concrete patio. He might awkwardly stumble otherwise. If I'm lucky, Tony will take the heading toward the street, which is his longest backyard route. Otherwise, I have to frequently run over and grab him before he starts browsing in the neighbor's vegetable garden. Sometimes Tony gets caught by the prickly plant buffet edging the garden, in which case I don't have to act for another couple minutes.

Adapting to the ways of the tortoise provides as rigorous a philosophy as Confucian ritual and as calming a lifestyle as Buddhist meditation. Now I should stop zoning out Tony's scratching on the kitchen door and take him on another walk.