In my younger days, I would catch frogs in the summer – cupping one between my hands and watching its convex eyes looking back at me. I caught myself a little friend – I wonder if it was ever scared of me. 

In my backyard we had a lake where the frogs all lived and hatched their eggs, until mom bought some Atrazine to clear the weeds beneath the trees to make our home look nice and clean – a suburbanite’s warped dream.

Habitats aren’t domestic goods –

When I check the lake, it feels like the perfect picnic place! Like dinosaurs, frogs become extinct, Most dying while survivors retreat to a habitat without Atrazine. 

Maybe if I plant some trees…The frogs will come back! They’ll be able to breathe! I grab my sneakers and run down to the lake

all with a smile taut on my face – But all I found were takeout forks. 

Email Tayler Bakotic at [email protected].