Second of two parts
Re “On a Day When Armadillos Almost Got Me Into Trouble”
[img]1926|right|John Schwada||no_popup[/img]All roads were leading to road-kill. And the carcasses of armadillos littering Texas highways. The architecture of Hindu-afterlife is tricky. How do you ever get out of its cycle? I mused. What if the Pope is right and suicide is a sin. Armadillos committing suicide to free themselves from their horrid little bodies might mean no escape at all. Suicide could just condemn them to a deeper ring of hell. I knew I was juggling religious apples and oranges. But ornithology or ontology – whatever – cannot be constrained by bean-counters.
“Shakespeare’s Hamlet put it nicely,” I mumbled absent-mindedly. “‘To sleep, perchance to dream, aye there’s the rub. For what dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil must give us pause’ – especially if the next step is reincarnation. In other words, death could just unlock the door to becoming a cockroach. No relief there.”
I looked around, realizing that to be quoting Shakespeare in public might test the tolerance of Beastly Ballers, even ones who could embrace as “positively awesome” a 125-year-old Aldabra giant tortoise or find redeeming traits in a loose-lipped mountain tapir.
“Excuse me,” said the condor attendant, having overheard my mutterings.
“Oh, nothing,” I said, moving on quickly, hoping the zoo did not have a cage for guests whose minds were straying into the wilderness.
I tried to regain my footing in the society of the sane by rejoining my wife and our friends. Soon we located and stroked a very quiet, very respectful opossum. I fleetingly imagined strolling into Bouchon’s with a ‘possum sitting on my shoulder, righteously fuming at the maitre d' that, of course, this little four-legged creature was my service animal. And that his name was Pogo.
Confounding. How Can He Be Nervous?
The zookeeper charged with overseeing the ‘possum attraction smiled. He told us that this bleary-eyed marsupial, a relative of the kangaroo, is nervous by nature. How can an animal that fakes its own death and sleeps hanging from its tail be nervous? “Remember Pogo?” I said to my wife. “’We have met the enemy and he is us.’ You know, Pogo, the ‘possum cartoon character?”
“Don’t mind him,” my wife said to the young zookeeper.
This was chastening, and for a while I comported myself in a manner befitting a guest at the Beastly Ball. I oohhed and I ahhed at the bestiary’s formidable array of residents. I nibbled on a chocolate éclair from the Taix restaurant. I inspected worthy creatures with suitable wonderment. Here, a crested capuchin monkey. There a pale-faced saki. I oohed, and I ahhed more. Yes, indeed, a Francois’ langur and muntjac. Very nice. I carefully sipped my chardonnay and ate a duck taco from Garnish Cafe. I dutifully kept up with the illustrious crowd of party-goers as it drifted down the hill, past food stations hosted by the likes of Celestino Ristorante and El Coyote Mexican Café, to the zoo’s “main street” for the grand finale – a silent auction, a live-auction and après-auction dancing.
Betty and Berman Bouncing Along
“Where’s Betty White?” I finally asked my wife, at the adopt-an-animal station. “She’s the queen of the Beastly Ball. I want to tell Betty about how she narrowly escaped my deadly talons.”
“What are you talking about now?” my wife replied, handing over her credit card to an attendant and indicaring we’d be adopting a leopard.
“Don’t you remember?” I said. “Betty White and Howard Berman.”
My wife wasn’t paying attention. She was busy paying for beef hindquarters for our adopted leopard-child.
Later that evening, I realized what a treasure Betty White was when this legendary animal protectress was introduced to a huzzahing crowd of zoo supporters and was promptly auctioned off. Yep, they sold Betty. Actually, an evening with Betty, hosting a behind-the-scenes tour of the zoo’s new Rainforest of the Americas exhibit “followed by the ultimate cocktail party among the animals.” The “Betty and the Beasts” package went for $11,000 to the winning bidder. Maybe it was more. Whatever…it was a lot, and I suddenly felt fortunate I hadn’t tangled with this icon a year earlier when I was working for Congressman Brad Sherman’s (ultimately victorious) campaign for re-election against his congressional colleague Howard Berman.
What Do You Mean Not Nice?
To humanize Berman (who had last set foot on earthly soil a hundred years ago when he was first elected to Congress), Berman’s consultants had employed Betty White as their political elixir. In a TV ad, White praised Howard as a great legislator – and a friend of animals, who also, had “beautiful blue eyes.” In the last 10 seconds of the ad, a blue-eyed Howard appeared on camera with a little white lapdog in his arms and said: “I’m Howard Berman, and my friend and I approve this message.”
I was hooting. Berman, the congressional eminence gris, confidante of Presidents, prime ministers and assorted foreign tyrants, was using a tiny, blow-dried lapdog as a prop to get himself elected! He looked like a weak-chinned, princeling-dandy in an 18th century painting in the Prado. It was laughable. I was itching to write the press release.
“No, we will not make fun of Betty White,” I was strongly warned by my political betters.
“But it’s not attacking Betty,” I argued. “It’s showing up Howard. He’s not a giant of Capitol Hill. He’s a silly man, cradling a white poodle in his arms.”
“It’ll be seen as an attack on Betty White. She’s a beloved figure, a woman in her eighties,” I was sternly told again. “Don’t even think about it.”
So Betty won that fight.
And after hearing at the Beastly Ball’s main event about the countless good deeds Betty White had performed for winged, legless and four-legged creatures, how her efforts had helped us appreciate the magic of our Noah’s Ark planet, where animals of every ilk (including ridiculous pocket-poodles) deserve to flourish, I thanked my lucky stars I had lost. Surely the reincarnated fate of anyone who dared belittle Betty White – or a Betty White cause – would make the armadillo’s life look like a breeze.
Mr. Schwada, a veteran Los Angeles newspaper and television journalist, may be contacted at john.schwada@gmail.com
