Many years after the cottonmouth in the creek incident that happened when I was a kid I had another run in with one. I had been living up north and returned to Florida for the winter and was staying in Gainesville.

I had a leather shop on Cape Cod and decided to open one for a few months in Gainesville figuring I could make some cash with all those college students.  Well, I broke all three rules of “location, location, location,” and rented a space in a little strip mall on out beyond the car places off Main Street.

The place was too big so I put up an 8-foot wall down the middle and rented the other side to an Asian grocery. To get my license I had to be inspected and the town told me I couldn’t build a wall without a building permit but I assured them I had in fact built the wall despite the lack of permit and the Japanese folks were quite happy over on their side. After some head scratching they gave me a permit for a temporary wall with the promise that it would be removed when I left in six months and the Japanese people took over the whole space.

Speaking of permits, because I had leather dye I also had to have a metal fireproof cabinet to keep it in. Since I had already built a wooden cabinet I just went to a local newspaper and got some of their old metal printing  sheets (pages in pre-computer newspaper days were printed from thin metal plates and rollers) and wrapped them around the cabinet. More head scratching and I got my permit for that, too.

I did not make much money, doubt if I covered the rent but I did have fun.

While I was in Gainesville that winter I rented a funky doublewide sitting on a couple of acres north of town about a mile off of 441. There was a creek running through part of the lot and plenty of woods. Apparently the previous renter must have been in the pot business because I found a bunch of old aquariums out in the woods, some with a few small pot plants still growing in them.

One day when I was out walking I saw a really big cottonmouth down in the creek trying to eat a good-sized dead catfish. The catfish was stiff and its side fins with nasty spines in them were sticking straight out. The snake would start with the tail of the fish and work his way up to those spines but he could not get them in his mouth. So he’d work back down off the fish and then angle around and start from the head. No luck.

That’s where I left him, chewing on the dead catfish, but I got to thinking he was pretty big and close to the trailer and my dog liked to explore. So I called Fish and Wildlife and they sent a very nice guy out who caught the snake and was going to turn him loose further away from people. The guy warned me that moccasins are very territorial when they have babies and are likely to be aggressive in ways other snakes are not.

Shortly after he left I went back to the creek and unbelievably there was another one, even bigger than the first. I called the Fish and Wildlife guy back and he came over for the second snake. He took his pole with a looped rope on the end and went down in the creek bed and nabbed this one too. The snake was a good five feet, maybe a little more and fat, as big around as his forearm.

“This is one hellacious cottonmouth,” the guy said as he dropped the moccasin into a container in the back of his official pick up. “Call me if you find anymore,” he said as he bounced down my heavily rutted sand driveway.

Luckily I saw no more cottonmouths and before long the winter ended and I headed back north missing Gainesville and sand roads and shadowy lives lived on the edge of town even before the city limit sign disappeared in my rearview mirror.

Behind Granny and Poppa’s house in Gulf Hammock was a path that ran between the garden and the edge of the swamp. At its end was a little creek, crystal clear with a sand bottom in the middle and deep muck by the edge. You might step in and feel fine white sand ease up between your toes or you might step in and sink slowly down up to your knees. It was hard to get out of and there was known to be quicksand around so there was always that scary part of wondering if you would stop sinking.

I remember reading comic books about people getting stuck in quicksand and slowly being pulled down until finally all that was left was one hand waving feebly over the surface. I read once that if you acted quickly you could throw yourself prone and very slowly “swim” across the quicksand to firmer ground. Probably not but I was prepared to try it.

Anyway, back to the creek.  Another one of my chores was to take one or two big enamel buckets down to the creek to get washing water. I had to walk to the end of the two-plank boardwalk out to mid creek and dip in the buckets to fill them then totter back to the house. They were heavy.

That was a good place to fish too.  Dig up some worms and rig up a cane pole with a bobber and a little hook. Stand on the end of the boardwalk and lightly swing the line upstream. Let it drift down and around the boardwalk. Try to maneuver it up close to some lily pads. Things waited under the lily pads. Hopefully a fish but could be a snake or even a gator.

One day I was getting water and when I got to the creek there was a huge cottonmouth moccasin. I put the buckets down and backed up a ways and then turned and tore ass for the house. I slammed open the back screen door coming in and started yelling, where’s the shotgun, where’s the shotgun? Granny said in the bedroom and asked why. I ran in there and she followed me wiping her hands on her apron. I grabbed the 410 and ran back out the door.

“There is a big cottonmouth,” I yelled over my shoulder.

When I got back to the creek I started to creep toe to heel just like the Indians did so as not to make a sound. I edged out to the boardwalk and he was still there, fat and dull black in the light dancing off the water. As I came closer he felt something and started to slither off. By then Granny had caught up with me and took the gun. Before he could swim away she threw the gun up to her shoulder and fired, cutting him nearly in half.

The current caught him and took him on down into the darkness of the swamp. Granny lowered the gun. I filled the buckets and we walked back to the house together.

For all of my life the way I have remembered this story is that I shot the moccasin before my grandmother caught up with me. I swear I have a clear physical memory of throwing the gun up to my shoulder and shooting before it was seated properly which caused it to give me quite a big recoil that hurt for days.

My mother said no, it was my grandmother who pulled the trigger but I thought she was wrong. Several months ago I was visiting with a younger cousin who out of the blue said, “Remember when we were visiting Granny and Poppa and you found that moccasin and Granny shot it?”

Just like that, a vivid lifetime memory declared untrue. It sure makes me wonder about the veracity of other things I remember but it does not make me question the emotional truth they have in my heart.

Dorothy Allison who wrote Bastard Out of Carolina once said in an interview with Ellise Fuchs for PopMatters, “People want biography. People want memoir. They want you to tell them that the story you’re telling them is true. The thing I’m telling you is true but it did not always happen to me. It is absolutely true to my experience.”