​Woman By The Lake (Level A2)

Every Sunday morning I jog. I jog around a park. The park is near my home.There’s a lake near the park. When I jog by the lake, I see a woman every day. The woman is sitting at the lake. The woman is holding a small metal cage. What is the metal cage for? She is sitting and doing something. What is she doing?

One Sunday I got very curious. I got so curious that I stopped jogging. I walked over to her. I got closer and closer. Soon I realized that the metal cage was a small trap. Is she a poacher? She did not look like a poacher. There were three turtles down. The turtles were unharmed. The turtles were slowly walking. The woman had a fourth turtle in her lap. She was carefully scrubbing something. She was holding a spongy brush. She was scrubbing the turtle’s shell.

“Hello,” I said. “I see you here every Sunday morning. If you don’t mind my curiosity, I’d love to know what you’re doing with these turtles.”

She smiled. “I’m cleaning off their shells,” she said. “Anything on a turtle’s shell. There can be algae or there can be scum. There can be even some wastes. If there is algae, scum or wastes on the shell, turtles can not move well. Algae and scum make turtle swim slowly.“Wow! That’s really nice of you!” I exclaimed.

She said: “I spend a couple of hours each Sunday morning. I am relaxing by this lake and helping these little guys out. She then looked down at the turtle in her lap, scrubbed off the last piece of algae from its shell, and said, “Sweetie, if this little guy could talk, he’d tell you how grateful he is.”

Adapted from: marcandangel.com/2013/05/21/4-short-stories-change-the-way-you-think/