The March of the Frogs

We had a little visitor tonight. Little to us, but not so little as frogs go. He was a big boy. Just as the rain started to fall, he came a-hopping up our back steps, which was clearly not his intended destination. When it rains, the frogs leave the wetland behind our house en masse and for some unknown and really insane reason, they make a suicidal trip up our yard to the front of our house and across the busy street to our neighbor's yard and then if luck is on their side, they make it back alive. We can't figure out why they do this as there is nothing of any interest to a frog over there (trust me, there's nothing of any interest to a human either), yet do it they do. I hate to see the street littered with the bodies of flattened frogs and have even on occasion gone outside during the rain with Griffin and helped the frogs get back without being run over by indifferent motorists. But this little guy didn't get that far.

Griffin went out and picked him up, which was no easy feat. The frog was repeatedly leaping several feet into the air and forward simultaneously (as frogs often do) and when he finally was caught, was so slippery-wet he kept sliding out of Griffin's gentle grip. We showed him to the boys who both sniffed him thoroughly. Edison seemed bored with the frog rather quickly, but Bram didn't like it at all. He went rigid and refused to move until I carried him back into the house and far away from the frog. And then Griffin put the frog back into the grass, pointed him in the direction of the water behind us and off went the frog back to the wetland, safe (from passing cars, at any rate) for another day.