Week in Seven Words #286

commencing
Mornings are delightful when I get a lot of things done. When I don't, the whole day seems to slow down. Futility and fear creep in with the lengthening shadows.

confronting
When he walks by, he hisses at us through his smile. I don't shrink away, but feel a rising strength, like I could strike back viciously if I needed to. I look over my shoulder to make sure he hasn't turned around and started following us. He's looking back over his shoulder too. Nothing happens. But we were purely animals, at that moment.

festively
The summer dresses on the rack look more like banners in blue, orange, and purple, meant to wave from the front windows of a house.

quake
The thunder sounds like it's emerging from the ground.

rosy
Asked what an ideal vacation would look like, I imagine lots of hiking, train rides, and English country cottages with gardens in bloom.

selfdom
I'd forgotten how funny these magazine quizzes can be, where stating your preference for a forest or a beach helps unlock the secrets of your personality.

trove
In what most people would use as a jewelry box, she keeps a collection of erasers. Some shaped like cupcakes, others like flowers and friendly robots. Also a few without any design, just the standard small pink block.

Blue Iguanas of the Queen Elizabeth II Botanic Park

Last month, I took a few days off for vacation, and my destination was Grand Cayman. One of the highlights of the trip was a visit to the Queen Elizabeth II Botanic Park, where you can come across the island's blue iguanas, a species that can grow over five feet long.

The blue iguanas, which are native to Grand Cayman, came very close to extinction (there were less than 20 left in the wild in 2002). The botanic park is one of the sanctuaries on the island where they're breeding and their population levels are rising.

They roam freely in the park, and so it's likely you'll see them as you walk around.

Here's one that was relaxing in the sand garden. A park volunteer pointed him out and said he'd just chased another male off his territory, so he was likely tired out. He tolerated the company of six or seven tourists standing around taking photos.


Another one was stalking around a picnic area. There are signs warning you not to feed them, but I suspect someone fed this one anyway, because it was moving towards us in an eager, possibly aggressive way. When they're warning you off, the blue iguanas bob their heads and open and close their mouths; this one wasn't making that kind of display, but it still put us on guard, so we backed off. They're herbivorous, but they can bite.


Lastly, we were on a woodland trail, which in February was dry and brown, and one of them came out ahead of us on the trail. It walked for a bit, stopped, bobbed its head and opened and closed its mouth at something in the shrubs, kept walking, stopped a few more times to do the whole aggressive head-bobbing display again, and finally settled in a spot of shade right in the middle of the path.


We decided not to try and walk around it, as it was keeping an eye on us and had made aggressive displays. It really liked the shade, right on that spot on the path.

Week in Seven Words #161 - Grand Cayman edition

botanic
Sore with sunburn, we seek the shade of the color garden with its wall of trees and shrubs, its tiny darting lizards and tropical flowers.

cock-a-doodle-doo
The free parking lot in Georgetown, by the harbor, is a grassy lot where roosters strut around, pecking at the dirt, dodging the occasional car, and crowing their hearts out.

cocktails
At the poolside, everyone is pleasantly soused.

cruising
The public bus is a van, but there's room for everyone who wants to get on. There are some bus stops along the route, but the driver will stop anywhere if you flag him down. He listens to the same rapid, unending, unchanging music that plays everywhere else on the island and that sounds better when you've had a drink. When people pay him, he keeps the cash clutched in his fist, even as he drives.

cyclurids
After trundling along for some time with its head bobbing aggressively, the large blue iguana settles right in the middle of the path, in a patch of shadow cast by an overhanging tree. It stares at us dispassionately, not realizing that it's blocking our way. We could step over it, or maybe try to slip around it. Blue iguanas are herbivores, and they rarely bite people. But why take a chance? So after several minutes spent staring at it as it stares at us, we turn around and head back. Humans, with all the force of our intelligence, foiled by a lizard seeking a little shade.

immersed
For the first time in years, I swim in the ocean. The water feels like silk. When I look down at my hands, they're green and white. Waves spill over my back.

respire
The labored breaths of sea turtles coming up for air.