#25 -Animal

I'm so glad this was the first image that came up. Today's topic is "animal" but I'm not an animal person. Then the topic prompt was, tell your animal story. Oh, an animal story I have.

When I was 10, I went on a mission trip to Costa Rica with my father. For a week, our church group helped build a new church in a small, secluded Costa Rican town. After our week in the jungle, our last day was spent at a Costa Rican resort to wind down and enjoy ourselves before going home. We were all hanging out by the pool enjoying ourselves when I decided I needed to go back to my room to get something. I went back and changed, got my beach towel or did whatever else I did, then turned to head back. I opened the door and there sat a monster like this. But bigger.

At 10, I weighed 80 pounds soaking wet in a snowsuit. The iguana in front of me had a body three feet long with a tail stretching the same distance leaving him six feet and a hundred pounds of terror. I screamed and slammed the door and ran back into the bathroom. I forced myself to breathe slowly. There were no windows on that side of the hotel room so I couldn't look out to see if he had moved. But he was a lizard monster and cold blooded so he probably hadn't. I strategized and rationalized. He was an iguana. I was not his food source. I could open the door, jump over him, and run as fast as I could. Iguanas could be fast, but not as fast as me at a run. Right?

Apparently I waited long enough deciding what to do, Dad came to get me. He walked through the door and said, "Elise! You've got to come see this. There's a huge iguana on the path I saw on the way here."

"Oh," I said. "I know.