Sori, 28 May 2024
Lizards are constant companions of ours on the hikes my wife and I do during the Spring and Summer, wherever we happen to be in Italy or in Austria. We see them especially where we are moving over stony, sunny ground. They streak across our path, they scurry away from us into the surrounding vegetation or down a crevice in the rocks. Sometimes we just hear a rustle in the grass or dry leaves. In rare cases, they sit on a rock and warily watch us pass, ready to move away at lightning speed were we to suddenly make a lunge at them.
Very, very occasionally, we are not at the centre of their beady-eyed attention, but that’s only because they are embroiled in battles with other lizards, fighting over territories or mates I suppose.
We’re not talking about spectacular animals here; Komodo dragons they definitely are not.
But that’s fine. I think I would get quite nervous if I came across lizards that big. I mean, they can weigh 70kg! I’m not even sure I would want to come across monitor lizards. The ones we regularly saw swimming in the canals in Bangkok were a good metre in length. Luckily, the species we see are quite small, I’m guessing some 6cm long from snout to tail. They are not particularly beautiful, although recently I have seen some lovely green species.
Lizards always take me back to my boyhood, those long summer holidays at my French grandmother’s house. She had some walls in her garden which were the haunts of many a lizard.
One of the games my cousins and I played was trying to catch them. Was that difficult! “Streaked lightning” sums lizards up well. The few times we did manage to catch one, it would more often than not break off its tail to escape. How we laughed at this! The casual cruelty of little boys …
I’ve been reading up about lizards, their biology, their ecology. Fascinating stuff! It’s at times like these that I wish I had studied biology. I did some biology at O-level and wanted to carry on with it at A-level, putting myself down for the triad of Physics, Chemistry, and Biology – anything to get away from odious mathematics. But the head of the Science department collared me – Fr. Michael, it was, I still remember his name and the talk we had. He asked me if I wanted to be a doctor, and when I said no, he said I would have more opportunities if I dropped Biology for the dreaded Mathematics. And so, like the good boy that I was, I followed his advice. My good friend Mark, on the other hand, did biology. He already knew he wanted to be a doctor, and a damned fine doctor he became.
I can’t say Fr. Michael was completely wrong. And in the end, looking back now over the intervening 50-odd years, I don’t regret the path I took. But sometimes – when I’m reading up about lizards, for instance – I do wistfully wish I had studied biology.
the heart thrills 