Sleep Warm In Your Fur: The Carnivale of Animals

Thursday, November 17, 2011

The Carnivale of Animals

How much can I say about The Detroit Zoo?
When I was little, my mom and dad would take us to see shows, with monkeys wearing smocked "Polly Flinders" dresses riding bicycles.

There was a great elephant Paulina, who is now buried in Pontiac.
When I was little, our school was often taken to the zoo as a springtime field trip. I would ride on the zoo train and see houses over the fences surrounding the gardens and I would think to myself how lucky those people were, living so close to the zoo.

Many years later, much to my joy and some others disappointment it was decided this Detroit climate was not a good environment for elephants(they had developed severe arthritis), so they sent our pet elephants Wanda and Winky to an elephant preserve. Just before Mimi came home,I would take my routine walk on the path behind their enclosure and watch a group of animal specialists practice walking Wanda and Winky onto a giant semi truck in preparation for their long journey to California.(It took a few months).

When we first brought Mimi home, I would take her a few times a week. In the deep snow, the docents would give us details on everything we wanted to know of the animals.

On one particular occasion, Mimi noticed that one particular polar bear was stepping to and fro. The docent told us that she had been held captive in a cage for a Puerto Rican circus. The steps forward and backward were a pattern she had established in the tiny cage she was in. She has gotten better since she now has a pseudo frozen tundra to wander on.

We have spent birthdays, anniversaries and holidays at our precious place.

Last weekend, Terry and I took Mimi and it was as magical as ever.
The butterflies sat on our shoulders, and the new lion enclosure (two of the lions were rescued from basements in the city) has heated rocks so we see them loll and recline right in front of us.

We are very lucky