In Awe of the Armadillo

One morning not long ago, an armadillo showed up in my garden. It pricked up its ears but didn’t move, staring up at me with dark eyes from beneath a tangle of melon vines. Not wanting to frighten it away, I went back inside and watched through the window as it munched on what was left of my late summer garden.

I garden like I write, with initial vague and often grand plans that give way to wild and uninvited ideas, as well as unexpected creatures like the armadillo. I’ve tried planting seeds from the garden store, the kind with beautiful photos and instructions on the packets, but the stronger, more vibrant plants always seem to take root from seeds in my compost bin, leftover bits and pieces nobody knows what to do with. As a result, accidental tiny pumpkins and an occasional mystery melon thrive in a forest of kale and native Texas sunflowers.

I suppose I’m like that too. An accidental transplant, I moved to Houston from New York as a little girl, too young to remember any different way of life. I learned to feel at home with the customs of the patch of ground I inhabited, but I always wondered what else was out there. At eighteen, I decided to find out for myself and headed for the East Coast. My Texas grandmother admonished me not to fall in love with one of “those damn Yankees,” but I didn’t listen. When he broke my heart and I came back home, she never said I told you so. And she didn’t laugh at my friends, who often asked if I rode a horse to school or had an oil well in my backyard, because of course that would be ridiculous. But when I eventually married a Texan, she gleefully gifted me the heirloom family china as well as a stack of dollar bills to take to my bachelorette party.

I never thought much about being from Texas until I didn’t live here anymore. The stereotypes felt trite, but the innate sense of independence mattered. That “don’t fence me in” mentality, Willie Nelson and Luckenbach, Texas, doing what you believe is right rather than having to be told by someone else, that felt real. Neighbors were gracious and invited you in for lemonade or iced tea. But it’s different now. People running things are so convinced they’re right and that shouting it loud enough will make it true. They try to fence people in, or out, without taking time to see what could grow, like the sunflowers that keep showing up in my garden, tall and bright, stretching up and out not caring what anyone thinks. Cultivating a garden according to someone else’s plan means letting someone else decide which ones are weeds and which ones are flowers.

I haven’t seen a real armadillo in a long time. It has become one of those Texas stereotypes, and is spotted far more often in logos and ads than in the wild. But when I saw that armadillo in my garden, gray and a little pink, almost raw looking in the early morning light, it reminded me of how I used to feel living here. Sauntering into my garden, she proceeded to eat one of my accidental cantaloupes, no doubt savoring the juicy sweetness of the flesh after the blistering drought of the summer. She ate the whole melon, the one I watched grow for a month, from a tiny ball of green fuzz to a hard shelled verandah for sun-drunk lizards. I didn’t even mind. Instead, I admired her boldness and determination as undeterred by fences and walls, she strode into my yard and made herself at home.

My Texas born mother, when confronted by unexpected guests for dinner, would put on her apron and say the same. “There’s always room for one more. Make yourself at home.” The warmth in her Texas accent, soft and sweet as the Texas sheet cake she was baking, made it feel forever true. She’d look over at the rest of us, a firmness in her eyes that brooked no disagreement, and urge us to “scooch on over” to make room at the table. I want to feel like that again. And the boldness of that armadillo, coming over uninvited to enjoy a feast in my garden, reminds me that my mother’s words can still be true.

I did some research, and it turns out that the nine-banded armadillo, the kind who visited my garden, was selected as the official state small animal. Apparently, the legislature believed it has attributes that distinguish a genuine Texan. I didn’t have much chance to get to know my armadillo—she left after the melon was gone—but from what I saw of her, I think it’s true. With a fierce belief in freedom, she ignored the fence and made her way to my garden, respecting what grew on the land and enjoying it for her breakfast. Thinking about it, I understand more about what it means to call Texas home. My mother knew it, and so did that armadillo. It’s the sense of freedom I grew up with, changing and adapting with the times, but always knowing, deep down, that there is room at the table for all of us.

The armadillo hasn’t been back. I check the garden each morning, but the melons are gone and all that remains is the kale, which I guess isn’t nearly as delicious. I’ll try again next season when I plant those seed packets, but my hope lies in the unexpected. I look forward to what appears from the seeds from the compost, the ones that offer the most interesting possibilities, wild and untamed like my armadillo. I’ll let it all grow, hoping that she’ll come again to share in the sweet juiciness of a melon on another hot summer day. I want her to feel at home here. And besides, she is the only one who enjoys my garden as much as I do.

Originally published in Our Planet Our Stories: Essays, Short Stories, and Poems about the Natural World, Grub Street https://grubstreet.org/blog/grubstreet-presents-our-planet-our-stories-a-new-anthology-featuring-writing-on-the-natural-world