Happy July, dear reader!
Now that school’s out, it’s officially summer here, and living in the suburbs, that means the children turn quasi-feral for the next two months. Which reminds me of my own childhood summers! Parents working and busy with younger siblings, I was often left to my own devices - and on the weeks when friends were on family vacations or away at camp, that meant long bike rides and exploring the hidden corners of suburbia on my own. To this day, I have to stop at storm ponds and wonder what the heck is going on in these murky little pockets of man-made nature.
If you don’t live in the burbs, or you do and never noticed, storm ponds are little man-made ponds found at the edges of neighborhoods, behind strip malls, or under bridges and just generally tucked into the corners of suburban living. The purpose of these ponds is to catch the snowmelt and storm run off water, not to mention the pool-emptying/car washing/sprinkler activities of the suburbanites.
And it also seems to collect random garbage - discarded coffee cups, sure, but also bigger items, like shopping carts that break the surface of the water, rusted and mossy like ship wrecks, or tangled orange construction fences and traffic pylons, presumably defeated at their post to keep the surburbanites out. You’re not supposed to go near the storm ponds, you see. They’re not safe. I’m not sure why, exactly - as an adult, I have to assume its because they are filthy. But as a kid, I didn’t really understand. They seemed perfect for skating - but giant signs warn you in plain language that no, you can’t skate. There’s fish in there, but goodness me, you cannot fish.
These mysterious pools always made me linger at the edges, wonder about the creatures living inside the reeds. You’ll find all manner of bird around the pond, some turtles, snakes, hear the croaking of toads. And once - I was maybe nine? I was standing on a hill that stood over a storm pond. And I saw something poke its head above the surface of the scummy water. In my memory, it looked like a massive blob fish, or monkfish - a glob of shapeless grey flesh with a massive gaping maw. It snapped at the surface and just as quickly as it appeared, disappeared into the murk.
I still don’t know what it was, but the truth it revealed was clear - something lurked in the dark depths of our storm pond. Which, of course, by my natural progression of thought, meant ANYTHING could lurk in ANY storm pond. Cryptids like the Loch Ness monster, or the Creature from the Black Lagoon, or - if we could be so blessed - Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Or even…. mermaids. And that’s just the storm ponds. The other truth the blob-fish pond monster revealed to me was this: things hide in the forgotten corners of the world. You don’t have to travel to far off places to find them. There’s plenty of magic and mystery hiding in your own backyard. You just have to watch out for it.
Character
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