Doug Huntman nestled his box turtle back into her giant plastic tote after a trip to get her nails and beak trimmed. He grinned down at her.
“Pokey, all nice and fresh!” he said, chuckling.
Huntman jokes about everything, but especially Pokey, the pet he's had for 43 years. Like her time at the vet's office, where she spent her afternoon — it's the "turtle spa." She had to stay for a little longer than expected to deal with an overgrown beak. That left Huntman home without her for most of the afternoon. It felt strange not to have her around, Huntman said.
“I got the turtle when I was 12, and obviously I have a lot of gray hair on my face now,” he said. “I'm 55, so that is a long time to have a pet.”
Pokey mostly spends her days dozing under her lamp, wandering around the house and crawling into cozy dark corners. She's always been around — through puberty and summer jobs, marriage and multiple cross-country moves, career changes and kids. She's the one constant in Huntman's life. Forty-three years of very mild-mannered companionship.
Huntman expects her to keep on trucking too — Pokey's in good health, he said, and box turtles can live anywhere from 20 to 100 years. If need be, his sons will carry on the legacy.
When he bought her all those years ago in Normal, Illinois, he had no idea Pokey could live that long. He decided to get a turtle on a whim. He had $7 in credit at a pet store, and there were two turtles for sale.
“A turtle could be fun,” he thought. But he didn’t know which one to choose.
“I set them both on the ground, and I raced them to see which one was the fastest,” he said. “Pokey was the fastest, so I ended up with Pokey the turtle.”
He slowly figured out how to take care of her. He built her caves out of Legos. He discovered she could climb after she escaped a makeshift enclosure. It took hours of searching before he finally found her under the neighbor’s wood pile.
He still goofs around with her sometimes. Recently, he bought her a couple of hand-crocheted costumes off the internet — a camo tank and a stegosaurus. And he loves to let her explore the yard on sunny days. That involves a helium balloon tied to a big rubber band stretched around her middle so she doesn't get lost.
“As soon as you put her in the yard with that balloon, she's running away from you,” he said. “It's not like, ‘Hey, let's play, let's have a good time!’ – Nope!”
That’s the thing, he said. She's kind of one-note. Every morning he’ll go say hello, ask her how she’s doing. But every morning, it’s the same.
“I mean, you would think a turtle, after 40 years, we would have some rapport, but there's really none,” he said.
She’ll look at him blankly. Any sudden movement or a loud sound, and she sucks back into her shell.
"I can tell what she's thinking. It's like, 'Today is the day he's finally going to eat me,'" he said, laughing. "So I don't know — there's not a lot of recognition there with the turtle."
He loves Pokey. But he’s not sure whether she loves him back.
“I don't know what turtles think,” he said. “I don't think there's a lot of that love or empathy. If I'm in a burning building, I don't think Pokey is going to come in and try and rescue me, or anything like that. If Timmy falls down a well, don't send a turtle.”
Turtles aren’t like dogs, he said. They don't really miss you when you're not around. It’s a different kind of bond. It’s the fact that Pokey’s always there. Huntman said that constant feels good, especially as he gets older.
Still, when family or friends ask how Pokey’s doing, there’s not a lot to say. Usually, not much has changed.
But, today – today was a big day, he said. She got her nails done, her beak trimmed, and she’s starring in a news story?!
“Those are core memories for that turtle,” he said.
Next time Huntman talks to his mom and dad, he’ll have a lot to share.
