Turtle tales....part 2

It was a little over a month and I missed my pet. Actually my daughter's pet. "I'd like another one" I told my daughter one day while we sat, discussing Etta. My daughter said she didn't want any part of owning another turtle. She said it was too sad when Etta died and she didn't like feeling that way. Plus she felt like it was a huge responsibility.

I didn't mind...we still had all the equipment and I missed my routine of caring for a pet. Growing up I 'd never had pets, other than an occasional goldfish...who would usually die the same month.

Etta was purchased from a Christian company that Boyfriend found on the internet. Although red eared sliders were illegal in Maryland and couldn't be sold here, the company would sell you starter equipment and allow you to *adopt* a baby turtle. You even got the little adoption papers and everything...lol

It was settled in my mind....I wanted to to *adopt*. After much tripedation, daughter agreed and we set out to *adopt* another turtle...another girl.

One cool March afternoon, my cell phone rung, "She's here!" it was my daughter calling to inform me that Tia had arrived. Tia was a name that I had decided on a while back. Guess I'm corny like that, I thought after making my decision. I wanted to be able to say Tia the turtle...Tammy the turtle, you know,stuff like that...lol

"Oh my goodness! I thought she was dead. When we opened the container, she just laid there for a long while and finally she decided to move." my daughter continued.

"Hmph...I'll check it out when I get home..I'm just glad she's here." I replied.

When I finally made it home that evening, first thing I did was check on Tia. There she laid, scrawny and lame looking. Tia was gazing off in the distance and never let her eyes focus on any particular thing.

Guess the UPS ride was too traumatic for her, I thought.

I picked her up. "Hey, Tia!" I said real cheery like. Tia just let her limbs dangle and flop around. Her tiny little head flopped to one side, never looking at me. What's wrong with her? I wondered.

The next few days, I paid close attention to Tia. She seemed to be Etta's polar opposite. I started out with the turtle food...she seemed to eat that okay. She slept okay too. Still, during waking moments she failed to thrive.

All in all Tia was still sweet. She was growing slowly and seemed to like attention. I purchased a small play box for her and a stout little ceramic turtle. After placing her in the box, she immediately scurried underneath the fake turtle, but became sad again once she realized it wasn't real.

Maybe she needs a playmate, I thought after watching her just lay there one day. I immediately vetoed that idea after I thought how much work it would be.

Everyday, I worked on Tia. We would place her in her playbox and she would squirm around, sometimes landing on her shell, with her feet up. She would lay there looking depressed and helpless. The sight of that would make me rush to turn her over. I did a little research and found out that when they thrash around and wind up on their back, it wasn't good to help. They would instinctively learn to roll over. This would help to strengthen their limbs.

One day, Tia was squirming around and wound up on her back. She lamely moved her limbs around and then laid there real helpless like. She stopped moving completely, laid there on her back, cocking her head to one side.

"Get up, Tia!" we yelled. "Girl, get up!" Tia wouldn't budge. I reach down to help and her my daughter laughed and said, "Ma don't help her..she's got to learn."

"I know, I know" I said reaching down to turn her over. I looked down at her and warned, "Tia if you don't learn to turn over, this will be the death of you!" I turned her over and she curled up apparently traumatized by the event.

Tia grew slowly. I purchased her fish as I had done for Etta, it took her three days to attack and eat. The book suggested that you not feed them, so that they would learn to hunt and attack the live food. Tia seemed afraid of the fish. She would hide from them under the rock in her tank.

Hiding was what Tia seemed to do best, yet something amazing was happening. She was learning to trust me. I could pick her up and talk to her, she would not fight she would just lay there and listen to me. I could let her go and she would climb up on my shoulder and just lay there, looking at my face.

Tia was adorable. Once I was laying on my bedroom floor praying, as I laid there prostrate, I could feel myself going to another dimension as I focused on the needs I was placing before God.
At one point I just happened to look up at Tia's tanks and she had come from under her rock and was staring directly at me. I pressed my face against her tank...she reached up as if to place her tiny claw on my cheek. This tripped me out!

Tia didn't sunbathe like Etta, didn't seem to eat much or enjoy swimming laps. She would just sleep most of the time.

One thing for sure though, Tia LOVED Boyfriend...lol. She would come alive when she saw him and bonded with him quickly. He would play with her and talk to her all the time, she loved and trusted his hand.

I was planning to relocate. I had gotten laid off my job and my daughter was leaving to go to graduate school. Boyfriend was the next in line to adopt Tia. So it was set. Tia would leave for her new home in Virginia, in a month or so.

One cold Sunday afternoon, we played with her all day. It seem to be one of the most animated days for her...she did some little tricks I had taught her. My daughter's boyfriend was there and when he picked Tia up, she nestled her tiny little shell in his huge palm and immediately went to sleep. There they sat, Tia and Boyfriend resting on the couch as boyfriend watched a movie.

Tia was so lively that day we took several picutres of her, as she crawled around on the floor and played in her play box. She is coming around slowly but surely, I thought smiling, watching my hard work finally pay off.

I had decided to go visit someone that evening. "Time for Tia to get back in her tank" I informed boyfriend. She had been out of her tank pretty much all day and needed some moisture now. I filled her tank with fresh warm water, careful not to fill the tank too high. As I mentioned before, turtles are not strong swimmers. Her rock was always higher than her water, so that she could reach a safe place.

Our ROCK is always higher than our waters too, I thought.

I placed Tia in her tank. She'd always approached every new experience with a hopeless demeanor. It was as if she felt like she didn't have the instinct to figure it out.

I asked my daughter to check on her in a little while. She said she would.

When I returned from my evening out. There she was. She had possibly climbed up on her rock and dived into the water. She landed on her back and didn't turn over...she drowned.

I went in my daughter's room. "I told you to check on Tia, she drowned!" I was sad and knew my daughter hadn't checked on Tia the way I would have wanted her to. I knew my daughter felt awful, so I didn't say anything else about it.

Lifting Tia from her tank, her eyes were still opened, she had the look of fright on her face.

Now here the kicker. As I mentioned in Turtle Tales Pt 1. I was going through a very painful dark time in my life. I wasn't sure what I was feeling at times. With every new set of circumstances, I would respond either in anxiety or depression. I could be despondent for few days at times over the most simple things, often asking myself, what am I going to do?

While staring at Tia the Lord spoke, If you don't use your God given ability, your troubled waters will over take you and the be the death of you...'

He let me know that Tia had been given to me to show me where I was. She had the ability to turn over, the ability to rise up...but she focused more on her fear and the troubled waters and not her God given ability. She drowned in waters she could have easily risen above.

WOW!

Now Tia deserved nice little burial, but where, I thought.

I decided to take her to the duck pond located in a business park near my home. Often times I would go there to pray and cry out to God.

I found a tiny box for her and wrapped her in tissue paper, and there I laid her to rest underneath the weeping willow tree.