TH IS I S ENOUGH A sunny summer morning at Isle Royale’s Daisy Farm
We’ve seen a lot of snakes in the week we’ve been at Isle
dock. I peek out the window of our thirty-eight foot
Royale. The big island teems with two non-poisonous
trawler Mazurka to see our three kids—ages nine, six
species: the northern red-bellied snake and the common
and four—at the other end of the dock, leaping around
garter snake. The garter snakes are unusual due to a
with excitement. They chat up two women who are
surprising variety of colors, ranging from red-orange
pumping drinking water, heavy backpacks beside them.
spots and stripes to black with deep blue stripes down
A celebratory camaraderie exists between backpackers
the sides, like our friend beneath the dock.
and boaters. Lots of people have talked to our kids in the two days we’ve been here. One effervescent hiker even offered our four-year-old a beer. I climb down to the dock and amble the long stretch toward them to see what is happening. The kids tell me to watch a small hole in the dock. Within seconds, a garter snake pops its head up.
Snakes are not my favorite. But like my kids, I can’t look away. We wait and watch. In our life before kids, my husband Mark and I lived on Mazurka in downtown Chicago, even in winter. We sought adventure. We went ice climbing. We backpacked the Resurrection Pass from Hope to Seward, Alaska, in six feet of snow and no vehicle waiting at the end. We
BY F E LIC IA SC HN E ID E RHA N
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