The Life and Dreams of the Curly Haired Imp

4/13/2011

Our Family had always been particularly prolific. The Mothers would leave their thousands of eggs all around the edges of our pond, each of them glowing a soft orange under the blue of the sky. Our Fathers would then wander through the eggs, deciding which would be allowed to thrive and which should be left sterile.

Other Families sometimes encroached into our property, intentionally or when they were washed downstream through one of the streams that spilled rich water which fortified our pond with new creatures that swam, crawled, or flew. It was fine if these others wanted to stay a night or two, to join in the Chorus of Night and add to our harmonies. We even allowed them hunting rights while they stayed. It was only if they tried to take part of our Pond as their own, establishing territories by quickening eggs, that a problem arose.

A particularly colorful Family had just arrived the day before. Their voices were glorious, ranging from the deep bass of an elderly bullfrog to the treble of a trio of tree frogs. While most Families specialized in one ability and usually looked alike, this Family was a kaleidoscope of sizes, colors, and shapes. I thought I even saw a poison dart frog pass me, her fluorescent hide glistening ominously. What’s more, the Family had begun to set up a large tent of leaves and grass, which was growing steadily sturdier by the minute. It looked like our visitors were fixing to stay. Grandpa would not be pleased. He hated rousting the derelicts.

“It isn’t Frogicide to maintain the purity of our race,” maintained my grandfather, on more than one occassion, his warty frame quivering with indignation. “It is for the good of all frogs and toads that we each know our own strengths and weaknesses, as well as that of our neighbors.”

“I, for one, am proud of my bulging throat and my strong legs. I may be slow, but I am strong. I am just like my father and his father before him and this is the Way of the Wood. I do not envy my toad neighbors their freedom from the streams and lakes. I do not envy our tree brothers. We Bullfrogs maintain the bass. We call everyone to song. It is how it was intended to be, and, as far as I’m concerned, it is how it shall stay. At least in this Pond, where we hold the Rhythm close and strong.”

Listening to the Chorus, I lounged on a moist bed of ferns, my skin breathing their lush green scent. My father soaked in a puddle nearby, attended by a recent wife. Above, a pair of yellow and green tree frogs from the other Family were performing acrobatics in the leaves lining the shore. They were particularly daring in their grace, soaring from leaf to twig, in synchrony. As the froglets danced through the air, they added their voices to the ongoing Chorus. Their high harmony pulsed and beat perfectly with the small grey toads who perched on the rocks above, unwilling to join us in the wetness of the Pond. A cricket hopped by. I considered snagging it but decided the music it would soon emit outweighed the snack.

The cicadas were buzzing and humming an undertone to our bass line. They were particularly noisy this year and we Bullfrogs had mixed feelings about the sudden invasion. On one hand, they grew much larger than the typical locust and provided us a bountiful harvest. On the other hand, they were incredibly noisy and their hum droned out our rhythm. Unlike us, the tree frogs and smaller leapers didn’t seem to mind the sound. They relished the usurping of power as the Bullfrog’s voices were drowned out by the sound. Their own voices flew high above the cicada song and the contrast between the two created unique high harmonies.

In this holiday season of thawing and growing, it was a treat to have these musicians among us. The cicadas’ emergence marked the end of the long cold. We would soon be free once more to blend and roam in the grasses and trees away from the pond, without fear of the predators above yanking us into the skies.

Grandfather sat in his usual spot, on the edge of a water-lapped rock directly in the center of the Pond. His neck expanded and contracted in time with the swelling of the Chorus. This night, unlike most, the melody was shifting. The high harmonies of the tree frogs and an unexpected bleeping from a small menagerie of poison dart frogs filtered into our song and made something new. Grandfather looked perturbed and signalled to his Bullfrogs to increase the bass.

The other bullfrog started a counter rhythm which emphasized the harmonies. Our croaks were coaxed even louder. My own throat flexed and strained to maintain my portion of the required volume. The peeping and bleeping and chirping pinged pleasantly in my ears. I found myself forced to sing more softly to hear the bells of their songs. Grandfather, noticing the drop in volume, glared directly at me.

Ever the obedient grandfrog, I brought my voice back into the croakline, submerging the beautiful trebles in our monotonous beat. As I sang, the sun dimmed and sank back into the edge of the Pond, where it lived. The sky turned pink then purple then violet. The stars rose beckoning us to raise our eyes to the heavens. Finally, Mother Moon appeared in her warty whiteness and smiled down upon us, her entire body shining and reflecting a halo around Grandfather.

The rain came as it always did, precisely after moonrise. We frogs rejoiced, hopping through deep puddles and emerging coated in the silky mud. Looking around, I realized we all looked the same. A few yellow eyes, a few orange, a few green. Everyone was brown, even the toads who fastidiously tried to stay dry. A young tree frog cheeped by my head and I spun around but he disappeared into the shadows, only his eyes gleaming with the moonglow.

After the rain came the gnats and then mosquitoes, rising from the Pond, forming dense clouds of whirring blackness. It was our evening meal. We thanked the Sun and the Moon and the Water and our Pond for its bounty and sated ourselves on insects, pond plants, and warm water. There did seem to be a scarcity of food this evening, I noted. The rain had only lasted a short while and the Pond seemed to be shrinking slightly in the warmth of the Spring. As soon as dawn arrived, I fell fast asleep, still slightly hungry, but anticipating the next night’s Chorus.

Twilight arrived and my dry skin cooled in the rising damp of the coming night. I opened one eye and then the other. Stretched my front legs, feeling the tightness which always occurs before my late afternoon swim. My skin was pebbled green, grey, and brown. I was developing my adult paunch and as I headed for my favorite part of a nearby creek, I hummed to myself, holding in my breath to increase the size of my throat pouch. The bigger the expansion, the deeper the voice. The deeper the voice, the more power you will have in the Chorus, as well as in the Frog Choir. My grandfather, the current leader of the Choir had the deepest voice in these parts. His low notes were so bass they vibrated through us, keeping us as one.

“Croak,” my Grandfather started, as the sun dipped back towards the Pond. “Croak, croak, croak, croak.” The beat was established. The other bullfrog answered, “Crack, crack, Crack.” The tree frogs joined in, cheeping, and the poison dart frogs bleeped a counter-melody. This, naturally, woke the cicadas who entered with their droning hum, and then, the crickets with their tenor song.

I didn’t add my own voice to the Chorus. It was enough to hear all of our voices together in one song. Grandfather increased the bass. He signaled the other BullFrogs to raise the rhythm until the other voices were obscured by the thumping croakline. The other bullfrog valiently attempted to maintain his counter-rhythm but lost his place and fell silent. The dart frogs slunk into the night, their colors undetectable in the shadows. The tree frogs went in search of a perch where they could continue their tunes. They, too, disappeared. Even the cicadas’ song just became a background to the raucous chanting of our Family’s Bullfrogs.

The rain was a slight drizzle and the evening meal left much to be desired. “There are far too many frogs tonight,” remarked my father dryly. “It had better rain soon or we’ll have to leave the Pond.”

The next weeks brought the end of Spring and the beginnings of our desert Summer. The rain tapered off until there was nothing. The Pond shallowed. The visiting Family had established a strong presence, eating more and more of the food as their relatives arrived from the drought afflicted streams. Finally, Grandfather and a few of the elderfrogs sat in Counsel and returned, asking the other Family to leave. There was not enough Pond to go around. As we Bullfrogs had been here first, they argued, we had the right to this place. Within a day, our visitors departed. Their grass tents remained and their mud pits dried. The Chorus returned to it’s staccato march, devoid of all melody. The cicadas migrated down the River, leaving brown carcasses attached to the trees and grass. Even the crickets burrowed into the soil, to avoid the heat of the desert sun.

In the silence, I wondered where the other Family had gone. Had they wandered up the river following the whisper of the Voice? What songs were they singing now, without our rhythm. The sun’s intensity on my cracked skin became a burning, a yearning to leave. I looked at my Grandfather on the only damp spot remaining in our Pond. His minions surrounded him, hoping to share his hoarded moisture. My father sat in the dry shade, panting. The Mothers huddled in the grasses, trying in vain to crush the stems. The grass was desiccated, the flowers husks.

I looked longingly upstream. My grandfather, ever watchful of my movements sharply told me that we had always been of the pond.

Another winter came. Instead of snow, we had wind. Instead of rain, the sun blinded us through clear skies. Most of the Mothers died in a heap, each shielding the other. My grandfather, despite his large size and great strength, grew weak and pale. His eyes were sunken, and his tongue, dry. I fed him what I could. Whatever I could find, bits of dried leaves, windblown seeds, even a mouse that crept into camp. Nothing helped and, eventually, he collapsed. On his deathbed, he forgave us for what we would do. Being entirely out of food, the Moon gave us permission to take sustenance from him.

With the advent of the thaw, there was no water in the Pond. The earth was cracked. Our skins echoed our land. We were covered in fissures and sores. The only insects came to feed on our pain and easily avoided our awkward tongues.

It was a day just into Summer, when I finally disregarded my grandfather’s words and headed up the dry creekbed. Each step was a misery, each hop and stumbling jump, agony. A few hours up the creek and I heard the sound. It was music. It was cicadas and crickets and water and it was rushing deliciously across rocks and mud. I continued, getting closer and closer, hearing the melody of the tree frogs’ song and the other Bullfrog’s improvised bass. Then, around a bend, I saw the sticks, the branches, the leaves, the water piling up behind the makeshift dam and flowing in an opposite direction, feeding a stream which had obviously only recently been formed.

The sound of the water led me into a small valley, shrouded in cooling mists and green. Then I saw a flash of yellow, then red, then a more familiar greenish grey. The other Bullfrog was there. “Hello, Edwin,” said the Bullfrog to me, calling me by my formal name. “Welcome to our home. Will you be able to stay to supper?”

I looked from him to the dam and started to shake my head when he started to laugh. He laughed at the demise of my Family, at the death of my Grandfather and our Mothers. I turned back to him and he beckoned me to follow him, up the edge of the rushing stream, back to the accursed dam. “Our young ones have been working for years, trying to let the water flow back to your Pond,” Edwin said to me, sympathy welling in his warm brown eyes. “We remove the sticks and mud as quickly as we can. But the Beaver is so persistent, he rebuilds his lodge whenever he notices a break.”

“Please,” he continued in his deep Bullfrog bass, “Tell your Grandfather where we now live. Let your people join with ours in this Valley. Come, Edwin. Let us sup together.”

The tree frogs and dart frogs harmonized with the Bullfrog that evening and I joined the Chorus of the Night with my Grandfather’s favorite bass line.