In the spring of my tenth-grade year, my dad packed up our meager worldly belongings and moved the Gerencser family to Tucson, Arizona. Three months later, I hopped a Greyhound bus and returned to my mom’s home in Bryan, Ohio. After spending the summer of 1973 with Mom, I decided to move to Findlay, Ohio, so I could attend the local high school. We had lived in Findlay for two and a half years — the longest I had ever attended one school, so I moved back, hoping to reconnect with my friends and church. I ended up living with two church families as I finished my eleventh grade of high school. In May 1974, I returned to my mom’s home, dropped out of high school, and six months later moved back to my dad’s home — which was now located in Sierra Vista, Arizona — after mom was committed to the state psychiatric hospital in Toledo (her second commitment).
I lived in Sierra Vista for nine months. I worked for a local grocery company, attended a Conservative Baptist church, and spent the rest of my time with a beautiful woman I met at church named Anita. (Please see 1975: Anita, My First Love) We hit it off, and our relationship quickly turned to talk of marriage. A few months later, Anita returned to college in Phoenix, our relationship soured, and I, once again, returned to my mom’s home in Ohio. I remained there until in left for college in August 1976.
Anita had a younger brother who was deaf. I wish I could remember his first name, but try as I might, I can’t recall it. One day, Anita’s brother and I were driving down the road near their home. I noticed ahead of us a large snake crossing the road. I said, “Let’s stop and catch the snake.” I got out of the truck and tried to catch it. As I reached for the snake, it recoiled and lunged at me, catching the fabric of my blue jeans. An old woman was standing in her yard, watching as I tried to corral the snake. Suddenly, she came running towards us, screaming, “Get away from that snake. It’s poisonous.” And with that, she smashed the snake with a rock.
I had no idea what species the snake belonged to. Come to find out, it was a rattlesnake that had dropped its rattle!
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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At least someone intervened when you thought about picking up that snake. Snakes tend to get mad when someone tries to pick them up. https://www.kare11.com/article/news/nation-world/hiker-tennessee-timber-rattlesnake/507-40cf8b61-3738-42d5-a65f-da05a16353fc Some man in Tennessee made the mistake of picking up a rattlesnake and it bit him. He had a fatal allergic reaction and he died from the bite.
Bruce thats proof that someone was looking out for you. (Bazinga! It was that little old lady). My retriever was rattlesnake bit at my remote place near Apple Valley, CA. He was paralyzed and I had a terrible time getting his 75 pounds to the vet. After $900, He was his old self with the exception of being deaf the rest of his life. Rattlers can cost you even when they don’t kill you.