Tale of a snake and a mosaic

Once upon a time (in April 2005, to be exact) a large carpet snake appeared on our verandah, with a HUGE bulge in its middle. At first we thought it had eaten one of our chooks, but no … 4, 5, 6 … they were all there, so it must have been something else – maybe a possum, a bandicoot or a small wallaby.

It sat on the verandah, sunning itself, and stayed roughly in that area, quite lethargic and sluggish for some days. It was so fat, its scales were stretched apart, so you could see the skin between them.

Then we started the renovations of the old building, which had become its home. Our dog, Banjo, was quite curious about this new visitor, but the snake ignored him.

The snake ignored Colin, my partner, whose nickname, since long before I had met him, was “snake”.

The snake ignored Peter, our builder.

And we continued building around it, hammering, sawing and stepping over it. We pulled off the old verandah, put up new posts and new bearers, and there it remained, still with the big lump in its belly.

The renovations were finished, and the snake still hung around slowly digesting its meal, until finally it did a huge and long snake pooh – a mixture of fur and white chalky stuff – the bones of the digested animal.

The next year, our snake appeared from time to time, and was observed with caution.

From behind the safety of the garden enclosure!!

To honour our resident reptile, I decided to make a bench along the front of my new studio, and decorate the top of it with a mosaic of a diamond python, with a big bulge in its belly.

Another year passed. Just yesterday morning, I was going to my studio, to see what damage the week’s rain had caused, when I almost stepped on our friend, who had obviously been driven out of his winter hibernation by the wet. There he was, on the paving, just beside the python bench.

I ran and got my camera and rushed back to photograph the two snakes together, having removed the sodden carton which was full of my latest find of second-hand plates.

Weren’t they beautiful? The two snakes together at last!! What a wonderful thing that I had stumbled upon!! And now the snake was actually going up beside the bench and the little ceramic bug teapot my daughter Matilda had made at High School. Maybe the snake wanted to make friends with this giant bug!!

But that wasn’t the end of it!!! Then it turned around, and started slithering along the bench. Right on top of its mosaic mate!!! I couldn’t believe it!!

and then it disappeared into my mosaic studio, under a table…..

THE END

….but not REALLY ”The End”, because the snake is still hanging around, and I have taken about 300 photos of it, and I’m sure there’ll be another chapter to this snake tale!!

In fact … here are 3 of the shots I took of it next morning. It is quite at home, sleeping in this box of old mugs. Would you call it a “mug shot of the snake”???

 

Look closely at the second picture. I must have woken it with the click of my camera!!

It is such a beautiful snake, I have really grown quite fond of it ….

But I must admit, I am keeping all the doors to my house firmly closed, as it is getting quite mobile now, as the weather is warming up. I don’t really want to find it in my bed tonight (one “Snake” in my bed is enough).