Frick Park
Pittsburgh
October 2013
At first I think it might be a Toxicodendron radicans reaction. You know, a poisoning by urushiol, the histamine-producing substance in poison ivy, or one of those allergy-generating, contact dermatitis plants.
Umm, it isn’t.
My dermatologist calls it, and these are the exact words she uses, “Itchy Red Bump Disease.” Guess what it feels like and guess what it looks like. The word we like to use for outrageous itching is “maddening.” It really kind of is. We believe this did not come from a plant.
Lisa’s friend Peggy lives in Arizona. Peggy’s son is graduating from high school this weekend so we are invited to attend and celebrate. Lisa has never been to the Grand Canyon so our plan is to tack that on the end of the high school festivities.
Umm, doesn’t happen.
Lisa is there and I’m here, home. With the maddening itching, I just can’t sit still on an airplane for four hours and don’t expect to be able to take the heat in Phoenix. Happy graduation, kid.
The itching is so annoying, distracting, offsetting. I’m unbalanced, frustrated. You might say “mad.” Best thing to do now is to take a walk.
It is a very busy walk today in Frick Park, one of my favorite local places. Picking my way on the rocky path above the creek, I hear a rustling and splashing below. A beaver comes shooting out of the water. A beaver! I’m seeing a beaver in the park at 11 a.m.!
Umm, no, I’m not.
It’s not a beaver. It’s Roscoe the dog. Clever dog getting me to think he’s a beaver.
I think I see ex-student-turned-friend Denise walking with her husband whom I met briefly at graduation. She certainly has Denise’s legs, which I recognize from hiking with her while wearing shorts.
Umm, it is not Denise.
I don’t know who she is but her husband is very friendly as we pass each other. He not only says, “Hi,” but he follows it with a sincere, enthusiastic, “How are you doing?” Like he really wants to know.
I think of answering, “Well, I’ve got this rash.”
Relaxing at a bench, I see a woman with her very large, grey dog. Next to her is a man with another dog, this one large and dark brown.
Umm, they’re not dogs.
I thought they were big grey and brown, snub-nosed dogs. What else would you have on a leash in the park? Pigs, that’s what. Perhaps I am staring. The man says to me, “Have a little too much to drink last night?”
“Umm,” I say.
“Or too much to drink this morning?” Sure, play it for all its worth.
They’re either miniature potbellied pigs or teacup potbellied pigs which are just smaller minis.
“Good pets, are they?” I learned that from Michael, another former student who, with his girlfriend, kept two pig pets.
“Sure are. They’re actually quite clean and can be very affectionate, snuggly even. They’re great pets.”
What he doesn’t tell me, that I find out later, is that these miniature potbellied pigs usually grow to about 300 pounds. Cuddling with a 300-pound Suinae is a whole ‘nother story.
My friends, René and Bob used to live on the edge of the park, just up the hillside from one of the trails. You could see their back deck. When they lived there, someone had placed a life size wooden deer on the slope. If you were sharp-eyed and you knew where to look, you could see it up there, through the trees.
Umm, what I am looking at isn’t a life size wooden deer.
It is a real deer. A real, flesh and blood deer, with spots and a white tail. I wonder if it is the same deer, the wooden one, somehow animated for my hiking pleasure.
Later I am talking with René. She explains that, no, it was not a wooden deer on the slope. “It was,” she says, “a wooden moose.” Which to me is even more thrilling, to think a wooden moose transmogrified into a real deer.
What else might happen here as I am walking and itching, walking and scratching?
There’s a metal signboard bearing a park map highlighted with colored lines indicating hiking trails. Two feet by two feet, it’s on a stand at a junction. Maps draw me in. As I look closer, an ant the size of my knuckle walks along, right on the colored line indicating my trail. He’s approaching a junction, the very junction where I stand! I look up. If that thing is built to scale, I’m in deep ant trouble.
Walking again, I see a four-foot long black stick lying across the trail. That’s about as remarkable as walking into another room in your home and commenting that there’s paint on the wall. Happens all the time.
Umm, it’s not a stick.
It is moving. It is a sleek black rat snake. I do not kick it off the trail as I might a stick.
Look at all I would have missed had I gone to that big gash in the ground, the Grand Canyon!
N’wait. That’s not the Grand Canyon…
