Happy Birthday Duane

In a pond somewhere nearby, a snapping turtle is growing fat and large.  Duane first noticed this snapper when he kicked what he thought was a little clot of dirt with his foot.  That wasn't any clot of earth but a complex life.  Its mother no doubt layed her eggs on the edge of the man-made pond a few blocks away and this hatchling managed to avoid every conceivable trouble to make its way to the edge of Duane and Janet's koi pond in the back yard.
Duane cared for that baby turtle and kept it safe, warm, and fed and it grew from the size of a little ball of dirt until it was a dinner plate sized ass kicker with a real attitude.
When Duane passed I made arrangements with the local herpetological society for that little tyrant released into a wild pond at one of the parks near hear.
Last year he was the size of a dinner plate.  Now, a snapper growing into his own almost the size of a car tire is probably biding his time in the shallows of some swampy pond somewhere.  He is the king of everything he sees and everything that sees him gives a wide berth if it can.  They say the mind of an animal like a turtle isn't all that complex.
Maybe its just an unlikely conceit of mine, but I wonder if that little turtle remembers Duane.  That giant of a being that kicked it over, and then set it on the right path again.

God's grace, Duane,  and happy birthday.