The week passed in a haze and not just because of the Canadian wildfires (yikes to the air quality around these parts!) My work called for heavy screen time (Rise, Inc. rolled out a new case management system), which meant not enough personal screen time to write a decent blog for you.
While my face was buried in work, I learned it was time to put our Honda to rest. We seem to enjoy keeping vehicles on life support, but the mechanic called our beloved Pilot’s time of death yesterday, June 14, at 3:33 p.m. We’re mourning the loss of the old girl who faithfully carted us around–and not only us but also the many relatives, friends, and thirty-two kids we hosted through Safe Families for Children. She was trustworthy (mostly) and showed us a grand time all the way to California and back on our Epic Family Road Trip of 2019 (and spent only two times in the shop for brake issues on that trip, if memory serves me right.)
But enough eulogizing our SUV. You didn’t come here today for the breezy recap of our week’s minutia; you came for something creative, which you won’t get (refer to the first paragraph, please.)
I did, however, land on a delightful story from a Twin Cities’ news station, and I think you might enjoy it too.
KSTP’s newscaster, Paul Folger, tracked down Toby, the Galapagos tortoise, who lived at Saint Paul’s Como Zoo from 1958 to 1974. Back in the day, the children at the zoo loved Toby. He gave them rides, and as the legend goes, Dad plopped me on top of the big guy at some point in 1972. When the massive turtle moved a centimeter underneath me, I startled and cried. I guess my two-year-old brain thought he was a rock instead of a reptile.
Toby’s tortoise friend, Lady Godiva, passed away in 1974, and Toby was moved from Minnesota into a breeding program in Hawaii that same year. I imagine him suffering the trauma of his friend’s death as well as the stress of relocation, and I feel for the slow-moving guy. But that’s just me projecting, so who knows.
Just recently, the Mayor’s Office in Honolulu called Paul at KSTP to let him know Toby was living his best life in Hawaii, no longer giving rides but instead relaxing and eating his favorite snack, cactus. He lives in a habitat with other tortoises, and he’s 91 years old, which is young, since Galapagos tortoises can live beyond 150 years.
Oh, and Toby knows his name. When someone calls him, he stretches out his neck in response, and he poses for photo shoots too. Isn’t that cute?
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