Visitors

"That will be $13.17, with tax," I said as I reached for a bag in which to put her refrigerator magnet of a Park vista and the postcards. When she handed me two twenty-dollar bills, I knew she was either a very new resident to the USA or a foreign visitor. As I placed her items and the receipt into the bag and handed her her change, I asked where she was from. "Switzerland," she answered. "Ja, aus Schweiz," I replied. She immediately relaxed as she said in English, "You speak German!" "Nur ein bischen (only a bit)," I said.

She turned to smile as she left the Visitor Center. "Auf weidersehen," I offered. "Ja, auf wiedersehen. Danke schoen," she said. "Bitte schoen," I replied.

Although I speak very little German and have an even more limited vocabulary in Spanish, if I sense that a visitor's mother tongue is either of these, I try to show them that I respect their culture by so simple a gesture as greeting them in a way familiar to them at home. It has worked each time, except when I said 'Good-bye' in French to one lady last year and she turned to lecture me on the poor French translation on an interpretive sign outside. My explanation that the translation was not my responsibility did little to satisfy her insistence on the purity of her language.

Later yesterday afternoon, I had trouble identifying the accent of the two couples who had questions about the identity of a black bird with which they were not familiar. One of the women said that she knew they were not 'Corvids.' So, I could tell her that the only members of that family here were Ravens and that no, whatever she saw in 'parking lots and cities, wherever there were people' were not Crows or Ravens. From her description of the color or males and females and the gurgling calls of the birds, Jane and I told her she had seen Grackles, probably Great-tail Grackles, since the Boat-tail Grackles are in Florida and the south-east coast.

Finally stumped about the heavily accented English in which the couple addressed us, I asked where they were from. "Poland," they said in a duet.

What I lacked in language to make these Poles feel welcome, we were able to make up with our knowledge of the local bird population. They were so satisfied that the woman returned moments after they left to ask one last question about a good trail to take. When I told her the "Lost Mine Trail" in the mountains and then they could enjoy dinner in the Chisos Mountains Lodge, she was delighted saying that my suggestion would make the other couple happy too as they were more interested in food than in a hike.

The visitors we had experienced the night before at our apartment were not so welcome. Two mice in one closet in one evening, stiff in the traps when we got up that morning. And now again this morning, just before I've sat down to type this post, I emptied the trap of yet another mouse. Our hospitality is past growing thin with these creatures. Visitors are always welcome and made to feel so. Rodent invaders will be confronted by my inalienable right to bear traps.