by John Jefferson
I was a hired gun for my grandmother.
Our house had a pier and beam foundation. It was built before concrete slabs.
Armadillos don’t see well and rear up on their hind legs when they are startled. Consequently, their number one predator is the front bumper of a speeding pickup truck.
An armadillo made a nightly forage under our house looking for food. If anything alarmed it – like a speeding car hitting that perennial chug hole in the street and losing a hubcap that musically rolled away — it would rear up. And hit the water and gas pipes under the house.
The pipes, when struck by a hard armadillo head, resonated all throughout the house – awakening my grandmother. So, she commissioned me to eliminate the ‘dillo.
Shooting one was and is permitted if the shooter has a valid hunting license. New licenses go on sale August 15 and are required by September 1.
In the 1970s, Armadillos gained status. It probably started with the humor (?) magazine at U.T -Austin. The editor told me he began using an animal-emojis at the end of each article. Many publications use something like that. When he ran his first armadillo emoji, he decided he liked it, and kept using it. But faculty censors became suspicious. They suspected a secret message. He was finally cleared of subversion, but the ‘dillo became a symbol for freedom of thought, even if not freedom of the press.
Armadillo World Headquarters in Austin became the epicenter of new-found freedom – or so it seemed. It hosted musical acts ranging from B.B. King to Waylon Jennings. The Armadillo also became the venue where “clod”-kickers and hippies surprisingly met and realized they could appreciate the other’s music without selling out their souls. For more on that amalgamation, Google Texas Monthly senior writer/editor, Jan Reid’s book, “The Improbable Rise of Redneck Rock.”
Another Beaumonter, Jerry Conn, and I both grew up in the sandy land surrounding town and frequently saw armadillos. They liked the soft soil for groveling for grubs and insects. We decided to honor ‘dillos by creating the “Armadillo Appreciation Society of the Southern States.” We had few members, no membership cards, nor secret handshake, but we designed handsome armadillo belt buckles and received good statewide press.
The Nine-Banded Armadillo even became named the “The Official Texas State Small Mammal” by the Texas Legislature.
Then tragedy struck. Science announced that ‘dillos carried leprosy. The liberal Texas Observer’s newsletter carried a cover showing an armadillo with blank space between each of its nine bands and a caption saying something like, “Just when you think you’ve got all your “stuff” together, someone comes along and takes you apart.”
It’s happened again. A study reported in “The Journal of Systemic Biology” recently proclaimed there are “four distinct species of armadillos,” according to the Austin American Statesman. Consequently, our Texas armadillo will no longer be known by the Latin name, “Dasypus Novemcinctus.” It’s now the “Dasypus Mexicanus.”
That’s taking current name changing too far.
JJ
