Non-pet performed amazing feats of color
By Mark Mayfield
My 11-year-old son recently purchased an anole, which is a cold-blooded, small-brained, shifty-eyed, predatory reptile, just like the telemarketer who called me last night at dinnertime. This little lizard, named Leo by an impromptu family vote, cost only $4, but the terrarium, bark chips, hollow log segment, water dish and two bags of very worried crickets pushed the grand total to $46.
(I permit my son to squander his allowance on such things, and he reciprocates by not telling his mother when I drink directly from the milk carton. This arrangement has worked very well since he became old enough to understand the importance of blackmail in a healthy father/son relationship.)
After several days of life with Leo, I determined that he wasn't technically a pet. An authentic pet can perform officially approved pet maneuvers, including fetching a newspaper, rolling over, responding to its name, reacting to unusual noises, and, of course, obeying the all-important "go-potty-outside" command. Leo performed none of these.
When I called his name over and over again in a happy, playful, pet-pleasing way that would certainly send any canine into a tail-wagging frenzy, Leo completely ignored me. My flawless imitation of an ambulance in route to a terrible traffic accident, a sound that never fails to activate our dogs' "howl-along-with-the-siren" glands, produced only an exaggerated look of boredom from Leo.
And the hypnotic hum of our electric can opener, which instantly attracted 39 neighborhood cats, didn't interest the lizard at all.
I'll skip the ugly details of the "go-potty-outside" experiment, but it, too, was unsuccessful.
Finally, in desperation, I mimicked the annoying tongue clicks my wife uses to encourage her horses to gallop, canter and trot. (I no longer watch my wife interact with livestock because I'm terrified by the sight of large, powerful animals nearly trampling a small woman who's emitting annoying tongue clicks, especially when said woman has several years left on her contract to "love, honor and tolerate" me.) Leo was not amused.
Regardless of his non-pet status, Leo possessed some amazing traits, including the ability to change his skin color in response to his mood. When Leo was green, we knew he was relaxed and happy. When he was light brown, we knew he was excited or agitated. Dark brown meant that he was depressed about his bleak financial situation. And when Leo displayed his bright red "dewlap" (throat fan), we knew he was REALLY tired of my ambulance imitation. A psychedelic combination of colors meant that Leo had been listening to my classic rock CDs again.
But Leo the Lizard didn't just lounge around the terrarium and change colors. After all, he was a voracious carnivore, a wily hunter, a finely tuned cricket-chomping machine. I'll never forget the evening when he sat motionless by his water dish, seemingly uninterested in several nearby teenage crickets who were drinking beer and trading dirty anole jokes.
Suddenly, one thrill-seeking youngster, who hadn't learned the meaning of the term "food chain," taunted Leo by jumping dangerously close to his face.
The punk was snack food faster than my disgusted daughter could say, "THAT'S SICK!!"
And while my wife scolded my son and me for exchanging high fives and yelling "You da MAN, Leo!," the departed cricket's family began to cope with the horrible pain of losing a loved one. Little did I know that my own family would soon experience similar anguish.
On an unseasonably cool Sunday morning, only two months after Leo captured our hearts with his wacky, lovable personality, tragedy struck.
We knew something was wrong when we saw dozens of crickets dancing in a conga line and wearing tiny party hats. Leo didn't look right. He wasn't green (happy) or light brown (agitated) or dark brown (despondent) or even psychedelic (groovin'). Leo was blotchy gray (dead). Our free-spirited little friend had embarked on that inevitable journey to the heavenly, beckoning light at the end of his hollow log segment.
Although our sorrow is immense, we know that Leo is in a much better place, a place where the crickets are fat, slow and stupid, a place where the water dish is always full and the bark chips are always clean, a place where 11-year-old boys read the entire book on anole care, especially the chapter about keeping the terrarium above 75 degrees.
Working with a talented team of lizard designers, Mark Mayfield (itsmark@sirius.com) is developing a new and improved anole that will respond to annoying tongue clicks.
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Los Gatos, California Since 1881
