Sit back, kids, and let your old uncle Ralphie tell you a story from a time long, long ago, when there was no streaming television, and we drank water right from our house’s faucets.
Circa late 60s, or a tickle into the early 70s; I’m not sure of the exact year. I was outside playing with my friends one summer Saturday (there was this thing called the ‘outside’ where most children between the ages of 5 and…could be found during the warmer days frolicking with their friends) when I saw a zebra lumber through the backyard of a friend I was running with that fine bright day. Yes, a zebra, in the tree-lined, dead-end environs of the Allwood section, in Clifton, NJ.
“Ralph, a zebra?!” you exclaim to my claim.
Here’s how it happened to be. Not a mere five-minute drive from the house I grew up in stands the old animal quarantine center in Clifton. Presently on this large plot of land, the city’s municipal buildings now reside, but back when I was a wee lad, the area was still being used, albeit not so often, as a place where animals came in from other countries and were quarantined for a time (yeah, they’d saunter right in with their passports, fill out the requisite forms and…I joke, I joke). In fact, many of the brick stable structures (see above) still exist and house various smaller offices and such of the workings of Clifton presently. It is quite an interesting historic spot, and I have heard that Clifton was one of only two such places in the whole country at the time, but don’t quote me on this.
Anyway, the zebra I saw that day had broken free of its quarantined stable and decided to take a look-see around town…and it came up my street.
How’s that for an interesting suburban animal encounter?
I just read that Turtle Back Zoo in West Orange had its own interesting animal encounter just recently. A black bear was spotted in the county’s South Mountain Reservation, simply too close to TBZ, so the zoo closed for the day. I know the bear population in New Jersey has been encroaching mightily on us NJ citizens, so this is serious…I guess. But hey, this is a zoo after all; maybe the bear was just looking for friends, or a place he could hang to get fed and eventually be caged.
Hey, it’s no zebra, but I’ll take it.
There’s not much of a point to this one, kids, if there ever really is, other than be kind to animals and they will be kind to you.
