A Frog's Paradise

Our home was technically a large cabin built on the edge of a slope that could bring death to anyone that took a wrong step onto it. It was probably a mile to the closest neighbor, and it was a thirty-minute drive to the nearest rinky-dink town. The stairs that went down the slope were ridiculously long and steep. I don’t recall them having railings. There was no shore, simply enough space for a foot or two. The slope literally met the dock and the water at the same point, but the water was shallow enough to slowly emerge into the lake when we went swimming.

On the left of this dock was a log that laid from land to water. Small enough that it could only hold a child’s weight like my own. I walked along it. Frogs swam in the little watering hole surrounded by the rest of the trees that still stood. They floated and hopped with delightful life and stared at me wondering what I was doing in their paradise as I entered. I squatted down on the log to inspect these creatures even closer. I catch a frog. Slimy with big copper eyes. Lines and spots go down its back. Its belly is white, bulbus, and softer than the rest. It tries to wriggle out of my hands. I maneuver my fingers around it and its legs so it can’t weasel out.

“That’s too tight! Let me go!”

Obviously, I drop the frog when I hear it speak to me. I watch the frog swim out of reach after plopping in the water with my wide eyes and gapping mouth. I bend down and grab a nearby stick. I try to poke the frog to find out if I actually heard what I thought I had heard. The frog takes one large hop onto land and grows before me into a man with a mad brow and eyes fixated on me. He sure looks like a prince to me, an angry one with oddly green skin. I lean back, too, far from the awe that struck my body and fall off the log into the mucky frog paradise. This odd green frog prince man bends over and reaches out with one hand. I lift one hand out of the muck, shake the muck from my arm and look back at him thinking I’m too filthy. He doesn’t seem to mind the mess, so I reach forth. He grabs my hand, pulls me out, and in one swoop he lifts me above his shoulders, and I ride on top. I grin and laugh with excitement as he walks back to the dock and drops me onto it. He smiles back at me before deflating to his original frog-self, but my face glooms with disappointment from his leave.

“Wait! Come back!”

“I’m not going anywhere. You be careful going up those stairs back to your mom, ok?”

I pause before I respond to a talking frog with an ‘ok’ and begin my way up the stairs. Once I reach the halfway point, I yell ‘mom’ over and over and listen to my voice echo through the woods. Of course, mom rushes to the edge of the beginning of the stairs to make sure I hadn’t fallen off the edge and sighs with relief and anger at the same time as she asks, ‘What?!’ I tell her my story of the talking frog that turned into a green prince who helped me out of the muck and let me ride his shoulders. She peeks over the edge, looking for a stranger before smiling back at me. She tells me to strip my mucky clothes on the deck and go to the front of the house so she can hose me off.

A few days later, I take my fishing pole down to the dock with a bucket of minnows. I drive the fishing hook through the bottom of the minnow’s throat and up to the top of its head. Its mouth screams open and its eyes bulge at me. I feel a mild disgust sensation in my gut, but this is how people catch bigger fish. I cast it into the water and begin to reel it in. Something seems to have grabbed a hold of it. It tugs a bit and then I feel nothing. I reel the rest of the line back in. The minnow swishes its tail, so I cast it out again. This time something strong has a hold of it. I keep reeling it in. It’s huge! I start pulling it over to the right of the dock towards the small bit of land that sits at the meeting point. Suddenly, large green hands enclose mine and help pull the mysterious lake monster closer. I move my eyes up his arm and see the shiny ruffles at the elbows. Energy flows through my body as my heart beats faster and I smile excitedly to see my green prince has come back to help me again.

“Wow! I caught a turtle! Look how big it is!” I shout and point at my discovery with one hand.

“Oh no! That’s a snapping turtle! Quick! Go find me a big stick!” He hollers at me as he takes control of the fishing pole, and I see a wave of fright glaze over his eyes.

I find one near the frog paradise and run back to him to ask if the stick I found was good enough, hoping for approval. He looks over briefly, grabs the fishing line with his teeth and breaks the line. He grabs the stick and starts pushing the snapping turtle away from the land and back into the lake. He holds out one arm to hold me back from peering too far over the edge of the dock.

“Stay back!” he shouts disturbingly.

Startled, I take one step back as I watch in awe as he scares the snapping turtle back into the lake. He stands up proudly, but exhausted.

“Yay!” I announce with my hands in the air. “That was so cool!”

He turns to me with his furring eyebrows. I begin to cower when I see his anger, but his eyes begin to soften as he takes a knee on the dock in front of me.

“I think it’s best we stay out of the water for a little while until the turtle finds a new dining spot.”

I nod with agreement as I continue to hang my head low and move my eyes back towards his and slowly smile back at him. He stands back up and walks over to his frog paradise.

“Wait!” I shout when I realize he’s about to leave me again.

He turns back to me without asking why, but I don’t know what to say. I thought he was going to stay out of the water too. I thought he would come home with me. He smiles again and turns back towards his paradise as he slowly compresses to his froggy being. I make my way back up the stairs and tell mom all about the snapping turtle and my green prince saving the day. Again, she walks out on the deck and takes a harder look this time but sees nothing. She tells me to stay away from the dock for a few days and warns me to come straight back up the stairs if I see the snapping turtle again.

A few days later, I head back to the frog paradise. This time I brought a big, black, metal fishing net used to keep fish alive and contained at the same time by hanging it off the dock and sitting in the water. I step back onto the child size log and start capturing frogs and stuffing them inside after asking each one if they are my prince. None answer. Mom yells over the deck that it’s dinner time, so I get back onto the dock with my netted basket full of all the frogs from the paradise, except the prince. I set it down on the dock so I can look again after dinner.

The next day, I go back to the dock after lunch. I had forgotten about the frogs. The morning sun had dried them out into shriveled, deflated frogs before I had made my way back to them. I look over to the frog paradise and see nothing. I cry to my mom. Mom disposes of my innocent mistake with a slight bit of horror and sorrow on her face.

Eventually, the weather chills the cheek and the grass frosts over. The woods don’t buzz anymore, and the green is gone. The snow begins to gather higher and higher. The sky seems to be forever white during the day. Something about the reflection of the snow and the atmosphere. We spend more and more time trying to stay warm by the fire and wear an absurd amount of layers when we need to go outside. It isn’t until the lake freezes over, I am allowed to play down by dock again. Mom grabs shovels and skates. We must shovel the snow off the ice before she can teach me how to skate on ice. She also wants to make sure the ice is thick enough to hold us. The further we go, the more we can see the depth of the ice decreasing by the width of cracks that have frozen over as pieces have reconnected over and over with each colder day. I ask mom if the frogs freeze in the winter after we throw our shovels on the dock and lace up. She tells me they hibernate in the winter. I’m relieved to think the frogs will come back.  

The next summer, I make my way back to the watering hole. I look around, but I see no frogs.

“Prince…”

I climb onto the log, but it doesn’t hold my weight as well as it used to, and my feet don’t fit. I stay closer to the section still on land and search for frogs. The area is muckier than it was before. The water isn’t as high as it used to be. It feels lifeless.

“Froggy…” I call out louder as I continue to look.

A frog appears before me with its head slightly out of the water and its eyes looking at me.

“Prince?”

The frog develops before me, but not as the prince I once knew. His eyes look tired and slightly annoyed by my presence. I hesitantly ask where all the frogs are.

“The watering hole is not habitable anymore.”

“What do you mean? Where are the frogs?”

My face becomes sullen when I begin to think I may be the reason the watering hole is no longer the paradise it once was.

With hopeful eyes I ask, “You’re here; you will stay, right?”

The man repeats “The watering hole is not habitable anymore.”

I feel a tear fall from one eye onto my cheek and I raise my voice “No! You can stay! I promise I’ll be good!”

I reach my hand out towards him, but he shrinks to his original form and slips under the water and swims away. I yell ‘No’ at him again as he disappears in the muck. I rush to the dock to see if I can find him swimming away, but I see nothing but blackness below and the ripples of reflection from the sky.

“Wait…” I whisper as I drop to my knees and bum at the edge of the dock.

“Dinner’s ready!”

I smear the tears from my cheeks with the backs of my hands after hearing my mom. I slowly pick myself up from the wooden boards. I put each foot on each step of the stairs, dragging them with grief.  I slowly make my way back up the stairs, back to my mom, to the only true comfort, home, and love I ever receive.