He stepped up to the biggest water moccasin I had ever seen, raised the shovel-while I made sure everyone stayed behind me-and as the snake raised itself up and opened its jaws, Granddad split the snake down the middle.
And because Ihad found it, I had the glory of keeping closest behind him. I ran up to the house, with all the kids running behind me, yelling “Tattau, Tattau!” to get the attention of my granddad. One day as I walked along the dock I saw a huge snake coiled up. We have five kids in our family, and we’d all go swimming in the lake, but when we’d see something in the water-and couldn’t tell if it was a turtle or a water moccasin-we’d jump out. I REMEMBER ONE SUMMER when there were snakes galore on Lake LBJ near Kingsland.
