I was 30 years old and living in London, England, when I told some friends that I would take their five-year-old daughter to the zoo. They said fine, but they noted that their daughter was fascinated by the wolves at the zoo.
The girl's name was Melania, and we took the Underground
to the Regents' Park. From the tube stop, we had a fairly long walk to the zoo. I was intent on getting to the
zoo. The five-year-old, however, was intent on examining every shop
window we passed.
Finally, we reached the zoo entrance. For some
reason, the wolf exhibit was outside the zoo, right before you got to the
ticket booth. I stopped and looked at
the wolves. Melania stopped and stared at the wolves. Her eyes were
focused and she did not move a muscle. She was transfixed.
Was she transfixed because she knew about Little Red Riding Hood or The Three Little Pigs or Peter And The Wolf? Was she
transfixed because she was face-to-face with predators? I did not know the
answer, but I did know that we had a lot more animals to see once I managed to
get Melania inside the zoo.
I cajoled and nagged and finally got her to leave the
wolves and move toward the ticket booth.
Inside the zoo, I showed Melania the giraffes, the komodo dragons, the giant
tortoises. She looked politely at each animal, but I could tell that
nothing had the same impact as the wolves.
I realized that I could have saved the admission fee.
No need to go inside the zoo; Melanie would have been perfectly happy to
look at shop windows and to stare at wolves.
I live in Valley Park, Missouri, now --- just a few miles
from the Endangered Wolf Center, founded by Marlin Perkins. The Center
focuses on keeping endangered wolf species from becoming extinct. They
breed wolves and release them back into their native habitats.
The Center sits on land once used to store ammunition
during World War II. The hills are dotted with abandoned ammunition bunkers. The endangered wolves are kept in fenced-in
areas amidst the bunkers.
The Center earns some income by inviting the public to
come for daytime visits or nighttime howls. It was about twelve years ago
when I decided to go for a howl.
We were seated in an old Quonset hut. A ranger talked about wolves and then taught
us how to howl like each of the three endangered species living at the Center.
Once the group finished practicing their howling, the ranger led us down a path. The path was sandy and
muffled our footsteps as we headed for a spot surrounded by hills and
illuminated only by moonlight.
Each person in the group got a chance to howl. I did my best Mexican grey wolf howl, hoping
to trick some Mexican grey wolves into howling back at me.
Nobody had any luck, until it was the ranger’s turn to howl.
The ranger’s howl worked.
Out of the darkness came responses from the surrounding hills. The hills became alive. Real wolves, somewhere out there in the
dark, were howling at us. I stood there; I did not move a muscle.
I was transfixed. I
was 57 years old, and I was having a Melania moment.
. . . . . . . . .
A very urban interpretation of Who’s Afraid Of The Big Bad Wolf, sung by LL Cool J. It is a 4-minute excerpt from the movie "Simply Mad About The Mouse":
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NOTE: Doug's best stories have been collected into a book: Puppy Out Of Breath. Price = $11. You can purchase a copy at http://www.puppyoutofbreath.com
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