“Ok, are you ready?” I ask. Jessie nods her head. She’s the brains behind this operation. I’m the muscle.

“Go!” I yell, and push into the rock as hard as I can. I don’t need to pick at all the way up – just rock it back onto its side so we can look at the living underbelly hiding below. Well, not we, specifically. Jessie. Lifting up the rock is an attention consuming job. 

The bigger the rock the better the finds. Little rocks can get picked up by just anybody, and that’s why the cool animals don’t bother hiding under there. They know better. They know they’re the reward. 

This is the biggest rock I can lift. There is one bigger rock in the area, but I really can’t do that one. I have no idea how heavy rocks are in this moment, but my best guess today is around 100 lbs (actually my googling and memory suggest it was even heavier, but I don’t want you to think I’m over-exaggerating for the sake of the story). The big rock is definitely twice as heavy. I can’t do it. 

But this one I can. For just long enough, I hold it up just enough for Jessie to search underneath. Sometimes we get nice big worms, or little black beetles, or just a bunch of holes that promise us we’re looking in the right place, just not the right time. 

“Salamander!” Jessie calls. Salamander! That’s what we’re after. The crème de la crème, the pinnacle, the name of the game – Salamander hunting. My arms are straining. I want to see it. 

Jessie is fishing around. Salamanders are fast and they look a lot like the red-brown dirt they hide in. It really hurts to hold up the rock, but I’m strong, and I like being strong, and I know lifting up the rocks makes me stronger. So I always try my best. 

“Jessie I have to put it down,” I whine. This isn’t the get-out-of-the-way-the-rock-is-coming-down warning that I actually need to tell her. It’s a childhood “hurry the fuck up”. 

“Almost got it,” she says. In my minds eye I can see her tongue sticking out to one side. She always tries to grab animals fast-like, as if a trap is being sprung on them. I think she should try to grab them fast, like her friend is holding up a very heavy rock and waiting for her. But I suppose this is why she’s the brains and I’m the muscle. 

My arms are shaking. “Jessieeee it’s going down it’s going down it’s going-“

“Got it!”

She pulls her tiny little arm out and I drop the rock. Phew. My face is flushed and warm. She has it in a tiny little air pocket cupped between her hands. Purportedly there is a salamander in there. 

I wanna see it. 

“Can I look?” 

“Not yet,” she says. “We can’t let it get away. Let’s get it in the cage.” I know we’re supposed to get it in the cage. I wanted to look ahead of time anyway. 

We brought a plastic butterfly cage with us. It’s clear with a translucent pink lid and 100 tiny little bug-sized air holes. I open it up, and hold the lid ready. 

“Ready?” She asks, her hands inside the plastic cage. It’s important to put the lid on quick so the Salamander doesn’t escape. 

“Ready,” I say. She opens up her hands. The salamander doesn’t go anywhere for a second, but then it scurries off her quickly and makes for the side of the cage. 

“Go go go,” she urges. These things have sticky feet. They can climb and the butterfly cage is small. Jessie pulls her hands out and I quickly mash the lid on top of the cage. It doesn’t latch immediately on account of my arms still being a little shaky. I finally, clumsily, get it into place. 

“Oooh,” I coo, looking at the little salamander in his new home. I can’t tell if he’s looking back at me. I decide he is. “I bet he wants some rocks in there.”

“We can get him rocks,” Jessie agrees. She picks up some little ones, ones she can carry, bug sized ones. Then we realize we’ll have to open the lid again. 

“Maybe we can get rocks back home,” Jessie says. I nod. She lives at the bottom of the hill. We climbed up to the top for the good rocks. “Wanna have some honeysuckle before we go home?”

I love honeysuckle. There’s a bush that grows near the rocks at the top of the hill. You pull off a little honeysuckle flower, and then pinch the bottom and pull. This pulls out the stem part of the flower (the pistil, for any botany police looking over my shoulder – this is a childhood recollection, ok?) through the petals, and out the back comes a little droplet of sweet nectar. You suck the droplet off the little bit of flower you hold. 

Jessie and I have a couple honeysuckle as a reward for a successful day of salamander hunting. But the sun starts to set, and eventually we have to get back down the hill, and there’s actually all sorts of snacks at Nikki’s house that you don’t need to suck out of a plant to enjoy, and what if the salamander gets cold? They’re cold blooded… right?

We get back to Jessie’s house before dinner and proudly show off our new specimen. Mrs. Jones gives us the appropriate adulation, says we’re the best salamander hunters in this part of town. I think she’s right. I tell her how big the rock I lifted up was. She knows this rock and it super impressed, and says I must be the strongest little girl she’s ever met. This makes me even happier than being the best salamander hunter in town. 

But after dinner, Mrs. Jones says we should bring the salamander back to the rock and set it free.

“What, why?” I ask. 

“Well, do you know how to take care of a salamander?” Mrs. Jones asks. 

“We were gonna get it rocks…” Jessie says, biting her lip. We forgot all about that. This does not strengthen our position. 

“Do salamanders eat rocks?” Mrs Jones asks. 

“No, they eat bugs. We can get it bugs under the rocks,” Jessie says defiantly, but I’m starting to see the writing on the wall. We can’t go and get it bugs …every day? How often do salamanders eat? 

“It’ll probably get cold. It’s cold blooded,” I sigh.

“It was warm under the other rock, we’ll just get it a new one,” Jessie continues to protest, but I know her really well, and I think Mrs. Jones does too. She’s gonna let him go. 

“The salamander is an important part of his ecosystem,” Mrs. Jones says. “You need him there to eat the bugs. If he’s not eating his bugs, there will be more bugs. And these extra bugs will eat more plants, and you’ll only maybe have taken care of your salamander, so we’ll have less of everything, except bugs. Keeping the salamander will upset the balance.” 

I look sadly over at the salamander. He’s just sitting there, looking at me, I think. I don’t really care about the bugs, but what if someone else wants to find the salamander, and we took him? What if there were fewer salamanders right now, because irresponsible salamander hunters before kept taking them? Maybe they were once under even the little rocks that Jessie could lift. 

I think of the plants. More bugs means fewer plants. Fewer plants means less honeysuckle. I love honeysuckle. Suddenly it’s important.

“Ok, we’ll take him back.” I say. I’m ready to go right away. I feel bad for wanting to keep him at all. 

Jessie agrees. “Yeah, salamander hunting isn’t about keeping the salamanders anyway.” She just came up with that, but it sounds really good. 

We grab the butterfly cage and bring the salamander back outside. He’s so little in the bare plastic cage. We leave the salamander on top of the rock this time. He can find his way back under on his own. It’s still warm from the sun, so he won’t get cold. Right?