Neither Tortoise nor Hare

As mentioned in the past (this one, not my previous ones), I don't believe in reincarnation. However, I was a sea turtle once upon a time, and I had a great many acquaintances under the sea and on sandy land. Wrasses and tangs and sunfish galore, flying fish and eelfish and an occasional bigeye tuna.

I spent most of my life swimming in the balmy waters of Lapakahi, off the Kohala coast, where annual rainfall was never more than a lovely 5 inches. I met my fate not far from there, on a tropical day in paradise when a 300-pound tiger shark took a bite-sized chunk out of me, snapping my carapace in two like the proverbial twig. I soon found my mortal self the center of some very undesireable and extremely frenzied attention, and that was the end of my life under the sea and the beginning of my sincere lack of desire for attention of any kind. I returned as a stupid rabbit in stupid Great Britain, annual rainfall a stupid +30 inches. Thank GOD for hawks.

But this is about my turtle-life, my sojourn of tropical bliss. Quite often, as a turtle, I would take lunch with my friends, Parrot and Trigger; we'd swim right up to the table coral and tuck into a nice peppery bed of Caulerpa. Then we'd push ourselves back from the table's edge to drift lazily until Angel and Butterfly would dart up from behind, to challenge us to a game of wits amongst the brain coral.

After a bit of lazy feasting and feisty play, I would float to the surface of the turquiline sea, avoiding the golden shafts of sun that pierced the ocean blue as if I were a human child and they sidewalk cracks. I'd poke my turtley head above the surface, take a quick look around, 1 second, 2 second, inhale fresh lungfulls of salty air, then sink below the surface and drift down to watch the silly clownfish gracefully slipping through the fingers of colorful sea anemones.

Daily, I would swim to shore and pull my bulk awkwardly from the ocean, across the jet-black volcanic sand, to rest dead-like while the sun dried every drop of seawater from my leathery skin. Then, shaking off the slumber-dregs, I would heave myself up and and drag my way back to the foamy edge where the gentle surf would lap around me and ultimately carry me back into the ocean deep, to sink and dive and eat and play with my friends, beneath the sea.

And then one day I was swimming with the mantas, admiring the way they fluttered by like butterflies, when they scattered and I felt a pain, and then I woke up pooping pellets and eating my own poop.