The Turtle That Used to Be A Boy and Vice/versa

"The Turtle That Used to be a Boy & vice/versa"  (by:R. Allen)

.Chapter 1

Where was one baby from, and going too?

Once there was this little boy. He lived in a beautiful Ocean house with his loving parents. He was given swimming lessons from a very early age. He was a good swimmer and was not afraid of the water. He always thought about his own safety. He spent a lot of his summers and free time exploring the beach and marine life. He liked just about all kinds of the different animals and marine life around the lake, but, "turtles". He thought some of the other things around were a bit gross, but he had a certain understanding that theses things were different then him. He felt they must consider their life as important to them, as humans and anything for that matter. He just avoided these creatures. But Turtles? His consideration for all the other living things made it even harder to come to terms with his intense, hatred of Turtles. He never really went out of his way to catch them. In all his explorations he did run across quite a few. This started when he was between three and four years old. He came across a turtle sitting on a piece of log near a puddle in his backyard. His mom was hanging sheets and bedding on the lines so the sun and fresh air would bleach them. The Turtle was about seven inches in diameter and maybe three inches tops at the highest part of his shell. The little boy took the turtle just around the comer of the house and set him on a paving stone. He felt sneaky. He knew he was gonna do something wrong. With the two big baskets of things his mother had to hang up, and him going just around the corner where he could just lean back and reassure his ma he was fine...he'd have time. He did Great-wrongness. First he got a pointy stick and tried digging the turtle out of his shell. Of coarse this brought a lot of blood. He felt very different. Weird and powerful. He even like the slickness that turned sticky after he played with the blood.

He was fully aware of what he was doing. Even at that age. He even thought about the turtles feelings. He finished him off and hid the remains outside the back fence, covered with the biggest rock he could lift. Yes, he knew it was wrong. BAD-WRONGNESS! On his seventh birthday he was still hating turtles. The things he did became more involved. It would suffice to say a person that seriously entertains evil thoughts can be creative in most atrocious ways. Things that normal people, ( meaning people with a respect for All that lives) would not dwell on.

Time rolled on till his tenth Birthday.

While on his tenth birthday he work up early. He could not sleep. He went past the mile patch of woods. Along the edge, close to the swamp. He moved along quickly. Then he seen a rather large turtle making its way toward the swampy reeds. He'd just have to make time for this. He was in a hurry to get to the big rocks on the other side of the wooded area. He loved climbing the rock. His parents told him not to go there without them. Of course they had all kinds of safety stuff. He didn't think all that was really necessary. It made the trips to climb a big deal so less often. That was the main reason he got up early. Anyway he snatched up the turtle and killed it more quickly then he would have like to. Then he was climbing the rocks. Man...he thought he was in the " ZONE", The rock was with him. He was higher then he'd ever been. Not scared at all. A hundred foot fall at least, onto the wash of the water and the big rocks scattered all over. He thought, I'd be lucky, "to died" if I fell from this height. He seen the man that played "Superman" in the old movies. He got thrown from a horse and was in a bad way. This made the kid know that there were perhaps things worse then death. He could never live like that. Then in the wash of the water below a bit of the turtles blood, the one the boy had just killed upstream washed on to the rocks below. You think about it. You figure it out. ....but...

     At that instant the boy appeared to be just thrown from the rock. He felt he had secure hand and footholds. And....as faith would have it. He was lucky. He died instantly when he hit a Hugh jagged bolder sticking out of the water. Then the waves seemed th carry him out to the deepest part of the water. Somehow? Someway? The current held him there. After he had been so long Everyone started looking for him. A big birthday party was planned. Everyone ended up having a search party instead. He was well liked. Except for his strange turtle cruelness. He was really pretty normal and popular. He hid the turtle thing. He never told anyone. He was always very careful about that sadistic craving. He never hurt any other animals. He didn't even bother with bugs, unless they were on him, or in his house.

     He was never found. His parents thought he may have run away. There had not been bad feeling among any of them. He was dotted on. Sometime later. He couldn't tell quite when. He woke up in what seemed to be a round case of some kind with a lot of goop in it.

Chapter 2



The Nightmare of a Pregnant Turtle

     There is this big sea turtle. She is very near the time to lay her eggs. Very pregnant to say the least.
This is not the first time she has given life. This is not the first time she has challenged death.
    As the featherless, furless, scale less grotesque combination of all animals combined reckon time., "The Humans"; she is very old.  Over one hundred. This is still prime child bearing years for turtles that have been known to live up to six hundred years old.
    It's getting nearer and nearer to the, "Time".
She roams the beach. Others are there. Other turtle Mothers to be. There is also the predators. This make her nervous.
With her knowledge, and her wisdom she gets slightly away from the rest. Gets as close as she can to the ocean. Then she starts to dig her birthing hole. It is on the edge of some grassy reeds but her bottom will be in there. It will be a clear, short shot for the little ones to make that mad dash for the ocean.
She works very, very hard…till she falls off into a sleep of total exhaustion.
    Then she has a strange and uncomfortable nightmare.
She dreams this is her first birth.  Out of the sand next to her sprouts a gnarly tree. It looks as though it is made of bark less twisted, burnt driftwood.
Instead of any type of foliage coming from the branches, eggs appear. These eggs hatch and within seconds turn into full grown birds. The kind that eat baby turtles as they are making their mad dash for that water.
   She lets out an indescribable sound. A cry, a moan, there's a sadness in this sound that makes her shutter. In her nightmare she is alone now on a dark beach, right beforea red dawn.
   She looks at them birds. She's fully aware of the color of nature. "Blood Red"! She ponders the odds of how many might make it to the water. This get her thinking about the dangers that await them in that ocean. Her heart is heavy, her eyes are full of a thick  watery substance.           She's crying now.  Without making a sound, she cries.
    The tree grows bigger, more eggs, more birds.
What can she do to protect the new life she brings forth into this world. She runs it all through her mind. It doesn't amount to much.
    The birds watch, they wait. These birds were not raised watching violent television.
These birds were not obsessed with bloody, violent video games.
This is  natural for them. This is how they were taught since birth. They don't consider what they do wrong, in any way.
This is the natural order, the color of nature, "Blood Red".
They are hungry. In her nightmare she is the only turtle on the beach. The birds look very strange.  They are not exactly like the ones she's seen in reality. They seem much more menacing.  Strange color eyes, sharper ridged beaks.
   She is scared for her babies and now she worried they won't stop there. She becomes scared for her own life. Oh how she wishes she never heard that mating call. She speaks turtle thoughts in her mind, begging a god unknown for defense.
   The laws of nature are unforgiving, take gravity for example.
   The time has come, she shutters with such force it wakes her.
It take her a few seconds to get her bearings. The eggs come. The eggs hatch. She has chosen well, this birthing spot. All the strong and fast make it to the water. Many make it.
    She recalls her nightmare, she would never choose a place to lay eggs near a tree. She grieves for the less experienced as their baby turtles are swooped up and devoured.
    She tell herself, she will ignore the mating call next season, but deep inside she knows she can't and has told herself that twice before.
    Oh but that nightmare.
Oh the natural order of things.
Why is the color of nature always blood red.
This is a day for many of her young to have a chance.
It is also a day for many a bird to have a good meal.
    She never forgot that nightmare.



Chapter 3

     Some unknown time later....

   The boy that fell from the rock found himself pushing, pounding, clawing and breaking his way out. FINALLY....He was out...scratching around in the sand. He looked around and was shocked. He was a baby turtle.

He still retained a memory of his life as a human. So...the thought of being a turtle made him sick. He thought, this must be hell. He heard a little about re-incarnation, he wasn't totally aware of what it was all about, but he knew. Some cultures believed you could come back to the world after you die as something (or somebody) else. Why a turtle? Why Me? A lot of human self piety, but turtle instinct took over and he had to eat and survive. He was now the living expression of a Sea Turtle. Caught between the consciousness of his former human self and the self awareness of the Sea Turtle he had become. He retreated into the thought stream of the turtle .

It felt right. After a while it seemed that the thoughts or memories he had of being human were a distant dream. Never-the-less his human thinking saved his life many, many times. What he came to consider gut instinct, was sub-conscious intelligence. One day he was crossing the beach. A giant bird swooped down and caught him up by the back foot. This bird, in the tales of the creatures that live, was said to be a stork. The oldest of the waters say that it was a larger more sturdier bird then a stork. "Stork", makes for good myth. Anyway..... This bird was high in the blue sky. The turtle was very afraid. He pooped...and peed. He was only thinking about how happy his life as a turtle was. He was wiggling to get free. He hoped he'd land in the water if he got free from the bird. There was thr beach, rocks, and water to fall into. He got free. Lost a couple toes/claws to the bird. He was happy he wasn't going to be eaten by the bird. Or spit  into baby birds mouth for food. He was super happy for about four seconds. The he realized he was falling fast. On his spins around he seen rocks below...maybe more rocks then water? He hit. He wasn't aware of it but it was the same rock he died on as a human boy. His shell popped right open. Landing softly in the grass and low warm water fell a "HUMAN" baby boy. Which appeared to have grown to the size of a six moth old child in seconds.

It's strange but it sure is true. Well all the other Sea Turtles understood. Some of them were hundreds of years old,  they had life s wisdom. They raise the baby boy.

     Apes raised Tarzan, The boy in, "Jungle Book" was raised by wolfs. This is not so strange. Like the turtle that could remember the boy he had once been. This new human child he had become, could remember large parts of both life s that were at other places in time. This helped quite a bit while being raised by Sea Turtles. The turtles brought the boy along quickly. It helped that he retained so much useful knowledge from other life s.

The turtles never hid anything from him. They told them everything they knew and felt about his existence. He understood them. He looked just like the boy the couple lost some years back. The couple had changed then. They were sadder. Withdrawn. Every holiday they half thought there would be a knock on the door and there would stand their son, older...wiser...and in good health. One day when the child was five, with the help of the old turtles he took the hike to the peoples house. He was only five years old, but he had the wisdom of a few life s behind him. When the people answered the door, they were both there. The woman looked at the little boy and started crying. His compulsion was instantly, loving compassion. He ran up and held her while she slid down the wall to sitting on the floor. Her head in the little boys arms. He smelled her hair and he cried. The man kept repeating his sons name. Shocked, Dumbfounded. After everyone came back around to composing themselves. The little boy told them the whole story. He remembered more then he ever would have thought. The couple compared pictures of their son at five and this boy, They looked exact.

This couple knew in some tangled, "Jackson Pollack" web of life s cosmic-consciousness, This was truth and without false hope they felt in their heart this was their son. Never-the-less they understood the legal system. First the father had the child s fingerprints compared with his sons. Exact. Blood test, again exact. Next DNA....Exact! Now they were sure. They were all very happy. They agreed that the story should stay between them. The move some miles north along the same beach. The world wasn't ready, nor were they ready for the worlds questions. He often went on hikes with his parents and took his turtle friends treats.

The End