A Blessed Event

A Blessed Event


It was one of those early July “dog days” like we had not experienced in years. The temperature hovered at about 99 degrees and had reached 101 for the last few days. It felt like the weather in an Erskine Caldwell novel. You could almost cut the humidity.

I had watched my prize specimen Hosta plants get bleached by the broiling sun. Their wide leaves looked like blanched Broccoli Rabe. In the early morning of July 4th weekend I walked outside and was happy to see that the local realtor had once again planted an American Flag on a stick in everybody’s curbside walk. I got up with the early light of day to water my plantings where the sprinkler system was inadequate. This occurred in the late 1990’s.

Our house was inland and not within miles of any lakes, streams and ponds. We were in a thickly residential development of single family homes. There is an ocean bay about a half mile from home. When I went to the spigot to attach the sprinkler hose from the back of the house to the front, I was amazed to see the largest bull frog sitting in a depression right under the hose spigot. There was a very slow drip of water emanating from the spigot, dripping just enough water to keep this poor creature from drying out. I turned the valve to allow the flow to drip a bit faster. I quickly called my wife to see this frog which was about the size of a baseball cap, but much taller. It just sat there and did not attempt to get away. We tried to imagine where he might have come from but drew no conclusions.

Not wanting to disturb nature I rigged up other hoses from the back of the house to the front to do my watering before the full sun could further burn my plantings. At various times of the day I kept coming back to see if the errant creature was still there. He was.
It was too hot to go anywhere or do anything except watch 4th of July celebrations and festivities on television. As the sun set on a pink horizon we went to observe our visitor. He had only turned around at a 45 degree angle. I tried to prod him with a twig and he moved slightly. I then saw that his rear leg looked slightly askew, and just not right.

I concluded that this is the reason he was not heading back from where ever he came from. This really bothered Paula and me. The next morning I said to her,
“ This frog survived to get this big and doesn’t deserve to die here. I f he is still in the same spot we have to do something to save him. Who knows, maybe he’s a prince. Do you want to kiss him and see?”
She laughed and said,
“No thanks, maybe it’s a she and a princess, I’ll let you have the honor.”


“After breakfast let’s do something to save him”, I said.
“ I hope he survived the heat of the night. I don’t want him to starve here either.”

We took a five gallon painters pail that I had and put a grass clippings and an inch or two of water in it. I then took a flat bladed shovel and dug in behind him so as not to hurt the poor thing. He was one heavy guy. I gingerly place him in the pail and covered the top with a wet piece of toweling. We concluded that we should drive a few miles to the town of Roslyn where there is a beautiful park with a fresh water pond fed from nearby Silver Lake. We pass that idyllic spot when going to a parkway or the expressway. It looks like a scene from a Currier and Ives post card.

I found a parking spot because it was early in the day and we carried our quarry in the pail to the edge of the pond. I slowly tilted the pail and let it start to fill with the fresh water. The frog went right out of the pail and went first to the surface and the dove to the bottom letting out a few air bubbles. We felt so elated to save this magnificent frog. We only hope that he or maybe she found a soul mate and had reproduced in due time. I asked Paula if this counted as a random act of kindness, I felt it sure did.

We speculated that someone picked him up while on vacation and did not what to do with it after coming home. It’s been over fifteen years since we released that frog and not a time goes by when we pass that spot that one of us looks out of the left side of the car towards Roslyn Pond as we pass by and calls out,
“Hi Froggy, it’s us”.

In this world where everyone is so busy, it felt so good to try and help one of God’s creatures that deserved to survive. On the 4th of July we always say
“God bless America, and our froggy.” Do you think perhaps we should have kissed it?