Desert Wildlife
Back to talking about the Arizona trip. As I said earlier, we stayed at a 55+ mobile home resort and I was fascinated. This is a world that I’ve never seen before. A small city of neat, immaculately kept second (or third) homes for people that want to escape the reality of cold winters. An age restriction to ensure that the kids/grandkids don’t over extend their stay. A gated community with a guarded entrance. A lap pool, play pool, and hot tub, with a clubhouse/shower facility so nice that people prefer to shower there over showering at home. This is the life!
Our visit coincided with less than 1% vacancy I’m sure. People start leaving for the summer sometime between April and May, usually returning between September and October. With the 104 degree heat I would too. There was not a soul to be seen with empty streets, empty pools, and homes shuttered for the summer. A/C units were shut off, large multi gallon buckets of water were probably left in the homes over the summer so that things don’t crack from the lack of humidity. All foreign concepts to me.
We took a walk one evening after it cooled down to the mid 80s. As we walked down the middle of one of the the many empty streets , I came across another fascinating observation: There was an abundance of pretend wildlife. Let’s take a tour.
“Wow Mom, what’s this?”. If Marshall could talk he would have uttered these very words. “It’s a pretend owl, and he will eat you if you get too close. Get back here and let’s keep walking,” would be my response.
“Look Ma! I found a pile of puppies!”
The piece de resistance – birds taking a dirt bath in the fountain. Marshall loves water and he ran up to the fountain expecting to stick his hand in the rush of flowing water. Upon closer inspection there was no water but plenty of dirt. He had a tough time deciding which was more interesting -the fountain or the odd-looking plant with razor-sharp protrusions in front of him. I steered him towards the fountain.