The Turtle of Michigan: List 3

I am really interested in the human skeleton. Dad took me into an anatomy lab at the university and it was full of bones and charts.

Even though Martin Luther King Jr. Day was an official national holiday and school was closed, King was hosting a special birthday party. They had to! He was the precious patron saint of the school.

She would be singing a cappella, all by herself without instrument accompaniment, which everyone thought was very brave.

She would be singing a cappella, all by herself without instrument accompaniment, which everyone thought was very brave.

His Omani hat perched proudly atop his head made him look taller. A lot of people had complimented his hat.

He tried to establish peace when there were international quarrels.

He was known as a tolerant peacemaker.

And he never stood high on a podium and said, “Look at me.” Even though his picture hung in many buildings, most people never saw him. He was humble. Maybe he was shy.

He would stride along cobbled alleyways and smell the smoldering frankincense, admire the pretty folded rainbow-colored cloths and stitched hats and glittering little lamps, and have a few tiny cups of coffee or tea with his old friends.

He would stride along cobbled alleyways and smell the smoldering frankincense, admire the pretty folded rainbow-colored cloths and stitched hats and glittering little lamps, and have a few tiny cups of coffee or tea with his old friends.

Sidi stepped up the ancient curb, heading straight through the lovely floating fragrance in the air toward Ali’s Palace of Brocade. This was the place many women came when they were planning to get married. They would buy beautiful cloths for their wedding dresses and to cover their tables.

Ali was already heating the water in a silver samovar on his little burner, stirring the tea in, and arranging the tiny cups on a tray as people in Oman and the entire Middle East had been doing for thousands of years.

“Are you worried about getting the tourist visa? I can help you. It’s not that hard.”
The tea was very hot. Sidi blew on it. He took the tiniest sip.
Ali was relentless. “The office is right up the street.”

Ali was also good at getting people to buy things. Apparently, he liked to talk others into action.

Someday we are all going to go to Australia and take a glass-bottomed boat to see the coral under the water.

“Maybe I’ll just wear my pajamas with three dishdashas on top and won’t have to pack anything. What do you think?” said Sidi.
“Fine! Suit yourself! Ha! You’re not a movie star. No one cares about your clothes.”

He took a taxi to the airport, walked gingerly into that glittering glass world, and before he knew it, was in a wheelchair since Ali had insisted on it, so Sidi wouldn’t get lost.

Sidi quickly realized that Ali had been right; it was a very good thing for him to be in a wheelchair right now, because he felt instantly overwhelmed by all the people and signs in this buzzing modern place, and he needed someone to take him to the exact right gate.

When Sidi sat outside on his roof in the old metal chair and saw planes taking off, then flying high overhead into the night sky, up there by the moon and the stars, he never thought about all this hustle and bustle at the airport.

Once Sidi was on the plane, in his own seat, confounded by all the levers and buttons that Aref had loved so much, and the man beside him had shown him how to buckle his seat belt, and he had placed his little pillow securely behind his neck, on the first leg of flying to Kuwait, he closed his eyes.

He would think about the Arabian leopard. Yes, perhaps there were only two hundred of them left in the world, but they were still proud, hiding out in the south of Oman among high desert cliffs and rugged mountains, finding food and water somehow, wearing their gorgeous polka-dotted coats, sneaking around in the dark.

He would think about mysterious sinkholes fed by springs, full of secret turquoise water, the holes channeling deep, deep into the ground.

He would think about fat honey badgers, cute as skunks, with their own pale stripe down their backs, holding their tails up proudly, making a parade through the desert dunes.

The Arabian partridges hopping in circles, chattering in families, showing one another where the grubs were.

He would think about the majestic sea turtles feeling tired and swimming more slowly as they neared the beach after their long, long journeys.

He would think about stretches of land where no people live, only animals. He had seen the ibex running against an orange sunset.

“Are you okay? Why are you in a wheelchair?”
Sidi waved his hand. “Ali insisted.”

They lined up to shake his hand, and Petra curtsied to him, as if he were the queen of England.

She said they had always dreamed about going back to a thatched-roof cottage in Ireland like their ancestors had lived in.

Even though Aref and Sidi were walking slowly, Aref’s parents had fallen behind and were stooping to look at some moss.