Moments that take forever

I loved my weekly chore of burning the garbage. The mission generated enough waste paper so that I could always get it started with one match--unless it broke, of course. You needed to fan out the paper to let the individual pieces get air--and make sure it was in a dry part of the barrel, so you could get a nice blaze going before it reached the kitchen garbage. An alkaline battery burned nicely, up to the point where it became a mini-rocket. Carbon paper in the flame went whiff and was gone. Waxed cartons sizzled a while and then blazed high.

The afternoon was dry. I pocketed the matches, left the carport walking by the sort-of fig tree (never knew what it was), went past the palm trees, and out through the "garden" we didn't do much with, the one with the yucca-like plant.

The ground wobbled under me.

I froze.

Squarely pinned under my foot was an oval-coiled yard long mamba.

I remember thinking both "I have to run" and "If I take my foot off he'll strike." I hesitated. In retrospect it seems like I took a long time, but I hope I decided quicker than that.

I pushed off the soft serpent and ran, screaming the well-understood warning call "Snake! Snake!"

The workmen waiting for Dad's instructions didn't hesitate, but instantly came running with sticks and a shovel. The snake, finally moving, thrashed under the attack, even flying through the air after trying to cling to a stick, and finally decided it was calmer to lie on the ground in several peices. They proudly displayed the relics to Dad, and the snake wound up in the headman's pot.