I posted Little Bitty Gator several days ago and, as crazy as it sounds, it’s an absolutely true post! A blogging friend, Judy at (theprojectbyjudy.wordpress.com) suggested a fictional follow-up story from the alligator’s point of view! Thanks Judy! This post is fictional…just in case you wonder…  Here goes:

Weird things happened to Buck. He’s an 8 foot long, adult alligator that lives on the Texas Gulf Coast near the Louisiana border.

When he first popped out of the egg, Papa Gator immediately noticed his teeth were all messed up. All the other hatchlings had nice, straight teeth. In a fit of anger he told Mama Gator, “That buck toothed, crooked smile, cross-eyed thing can’t be my son!”  Papa called him Buck from then on.

Papa and Mama Gator had it out more than once over Buck! Papa Gator accused her of going several miles over and visiting one of the Louisiana riff raff gators when Papa and some of his buddies were on vacation one week trolling for house cats in golf course ponds.

Papa snorted, “He sure looks like that boneheaded, dragon faced gator you used to like out in the swamps!”

Mama Gator was livid!  With much gnashing of teeth, and in no uncertain terms, she informed Papa that ALL the eggs were his!  “That’s why the whole nest hatched out with pooched bellies and extra bumps on their faces! They took after YOUR dimwitted family!”

After laying that batch of eggs, Mama Gator went into post eggtum depression and cried crocodile tears for weeks.

In the mean time, the Gator kids, Buck, Navi, Casti, Liti, Investi, Insta, Interro, Congre, Dele, Subja, Propa and Forni, all fended for themselves.

One day Papa Gator fussed at the kids for sunning themselves on the bank all day and swimming all night long.

Mama was so upset she took her things and spent a month with her sister, Alli, while Papa went up-stream to stay with Crock, a distant cousin.

Even so, they were still Mama Gator’s brood, and she was highly concerned that her precious little reptilian offspring would end up as purses, belts, or pairs of Justin cowboy boots!

Most of that pod though were successful! In fact, every one, except Buck, went off to college at the University of Florida!

Poor ole Buck’s brain was somewhere down the food chain.  Mama made excuses for him saying she may have accidentally dropped him on his head on an oyster bed, or that the pollution in the bayou just fried his little brain. Whatever!

Occasionally humans came around shining spotlights at night.  When Buck was a little bitty gator, some human shined a light on him and instead of his eyes shining deep, dark red, they shined hot pink. The other gators teased Buck mercilessly about this!

It was just a sign, because by all accounts, Buck never was quite right. At best, he was a backwoods, gray neck gator.

On the day Buck reached 8 feet long, he decided he was going gangster on the pod.  In his little Darwin impaired mind, Buck figured if he death rolled a human, maybe, just maybe he could some get some alligator respect!

He dreamed of starting his own gang and calling it the Bayou Bashers, Hell’s Reptiles, or maybe the Westside Lizards!

Just two nights later, a couple of male humans in a little boat came floating into the hood.  Well, Buck swam right up in the pathway of those humans!  He was positive that they would fear his toothy bite and reptile power, and then flee, making him look like King of the Crip!

Although Buck was uncertain, he acted tough on top of the water waiting for the humans to scamper away terrified just to show the other hoodlum gators how gatorly he was.

The deal, however, went bad! One of the scatter brained humans jumped out of the boat and grabbed hold of him.

Buck didn’t have a counter strategy! Besides, the wiry little human landed squarely on his back and wrapped both arms and legs up as tight as an anaconda on an armadillo!

Buck began to thrash, and by the light of the spotlight, became absolutely terrified when he saw from his left eye the eye of the human looking directly in his!

Buck was surprised by how strong the human was.  He dove and rolled, but the human held on!  For the first time in his mindless life, Buck thought he was about to become tanned hide, and his meat fried and sold from a flea market food truck!

Buck tried to get his short little legs to scratch the human so he could get away. Didn’t work.  Buck dove under water and tried to drown him, but Buck’s adreline made him need to come up over and over for air.

The human was holding on with WWF wrestling moves. Buck tried to get back to the surface, and every time he jerked his head up, the human’s chin hit the bony part of his head. This was followed by a knock of the back of the human’s head on the boat bottom which covered them both up.

Somehow, someway, the human’s grip loosened, or Buck’s thrashing broke free. No one knows for sure.  Buck swam faster than he’d ever swam before to get to safety.

For a long while, all Buck could think was, “I lived! I lived! I lived!”

For Buck it was a life changer.  He apologized to the Gator family. No more would he go gangster. No longer would he claim to have all the answers. Never again would he seek a life of gator crime.

He changed.

Buck started over. He went back to school, took remedial kindergator classes and went on to get his high school GED (Gator Education Diploma). He had to work at it, and even developed the nickname of Einstein among his family and friends.

After graduation, Buck committed himself to a life of public service working with juvenile, backwards, and tooth impaired gators because he wanted to make a difference.

And so, Einstein did.

(Disclaimer: Any likeness or similarity to any person or gator you may know is strictly coincidental.  No gators or humans were injured in the making of this story.)