I was reading at a Starbucks on the northeast side of Colorado Springs one morning last month when a teenage couple walked into the cafe. The girl was pulling a large suitcase and was wearing a baggy beige Cabela’s sweatshirt with pictures of deer and oversized grey sweatpants. The boy was similarly unkempt, wearing jeans three sizes too big and a dark, zip-up hoodie with pictures of marijuana leaves down the sleeves. His black hat was pulled low across his forehead so that his eyes disappeared behind the bill. The girl ordered and they went onto the patio to smoke as they drank, leaving the suitcase inside.

Voles, pocket gophers, squirrels, and snakes live right alongside us Coloradans. As gardeners we have absolutely no interest in “sharing our space” but the cold hard fact is that we really have no say in the matter. But, maybe, just maybe by the grace of God and with few Hail Mary’s we can learn how to manage these creatures and live peacefully.

Let me just get this out of the way:  the band Black Sabbath is not for everyone.  If their choice of band name is not enough to turn off good and proper people, the anecdotes of their excessive living are sufficiently dissuasive.  It is an infamy that stems, in large part, from their lead singer Ozzy Osbourne who, for those of my generation, was the subject of playground legend for biting off the head of a live bat during a concert in 1982 (which is not fiction, by the way).

Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!” exclaimed a very concerned Dorothy in the classic 1939 film “The Wizard of Oz.”

Here in Colorado, gardeners are just as exasperated by our “wildlife vs. garden plants” situation.

Editor’s Note: Following is the text of a talk delivered by Stephen Ambuul, a recent graduate of the Chesterton Academy of Our Lady of Walsingham, at the school’s annual gala and auction on March 25. The gala raised more than $100,00 for the school.