As children grow up, parents find new ways to stay connected with them. Or maybe it’s the same as it ever was? Writer Jill Sisson Quinn explores this while enjoying time with her son in the great outdoors in an essay for WPR’s “Wisconsin Life.”
‘Turtle Minute’
Along the Waupaca Chain of Lakes, a system of 22 spring-fed, glacial lakes in central Wisconsin, lies Tom Thumb Minigolf, and the promise of a game is a good way to get my sports-obsessed son on the water. I tried to raise a nature-lover like me, but instead, I got a 10U baseball all-star. One July day, we head to an unofficial boat launch on the south side of Marl Lake, so named because of its clayish, inorganic bottom, which results in gorgeous sea-green waters.
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We make our way through Marl, Pope, Manomin and Knight Lakes to Beasley Creek, a short easy paddle, then pull up our kayaks on the lawn next to Tom Thumb. We golf the 18 holes. I win! My son wins a ball in the Tom Thumb arcade. After ice creams from the snack shack, we dip back into our kayaks for the upstream paddle home. “Old school fun for the entire family,” reads the website of Tom Thumb, which has been around since 1950. It’s a welcome break from the succession of baseball games which comprise most of our summer.
When Beasley Creek opens into Knight Lake, I throw the ball ahead of us. We race toward it in our kayaks to see who can get to it first. My son raises his paddle like a bat so I pitch to him, and we envision what a kayak-baseball game might look like.
My son’s kayak is a kid’s self-bailing craft meant to be easy to climb back onto if you fall out. He knows this, and it’s getting hot, so into the water he goes. He tips over again and again, throwing me his baseball cap to hold onto.
Finally cooled off, he paddles toward the exit of Knight and the pass to Manomin. I follow behind, turning my kayak slightly to avoid a formidable-looking two-pronged log sticking out of the water. Suddenly, the log disappears beneath the surface. The knobby peaks I saw were no log, but the beak and front paw of a snapping turtle.
“Look at this huge snapper!” I call. My son turns around and paddles over so that we sandwich the turtle with our boats. The shell is easily a foot and a half long, but most impressive is that thick, muddy head, looking like a cross between plant and animal. Unbothered by us, it spreads its long toenails and swims right under my kayak.
My son resumes his trip toward Manomin while I snap a few pictures.
Soon, he yells with his own excitement: “A painter!”
I paddle over. Beneath him, with face and shell markings as orange and yellow as our kayaks, floats a painted turtle angled up toward the sun and down toward the bottom of the pond like its own little planet tilted on just the right axis. It surfaces for air then dives back down.
“Let’s call this ‘Turtle Minute,’” my son says, “because we saw two turtles within a few seconds of each other.” Then he races off to Marl Lake, where he’ll jump into the water again — giant snappers and all — for another swim. I smile that this moment holds enough importance to be named by him.
Perhaps I have raised a nature-lover. It may have only been a minute, but we were present with our turtle brother and sister, my son a triplet swimming with them in the Earth’s many-chambered womb.
“Wisconsin Life” is a co-production of Wisconsin Public Radio and PBS Wisconsin. The project celebrates what makes the state unique through the diverse stories of its people, places, history and culture.
