"THE LIZARD AT THE CIRCUS" - ACT I

Act 1

One thing that I like to do is to stop and observe things around me. I have long decided NOT to be like other lizard. In fact, I despised them; I despised their pathetic meaningless life. So, I turn my observations to something else.

As I said before, I live in this GIANT world with GIANT creatures called humans. They never stop to fascinate me. Sure, there are other giant animals in this world; but they are not even half as fun as humans. Those animals have no cars, no big houses, no schools, no malls, etc. Worse, just like my kinds, they all don’t seem to have any purpose in life. That’s why; I decided I want to be human since early in life. At least, I’m trying to be one.

Human are really interesting species. There are so many of them in this world, but I observe one thing – they are objects of contradictions. For example, they either get along very well with their kinds – too well even – or they completely hate each other. From day to day I see them gather around, male species with female species, males with males, females with females, in big and small groups – but at the same time I see a lot of fighting with them too, in all sorts of combinations. It’s all very exciting to me, since I’m practically friendless (and correspondingly, enemy-less – except for those animals who eats lizards as their dinner).

Another interesting thing to see is the interaction between humans and other animals. Again, it’s full of contradictions, as the humans either love the animals so much that they become part of the family (sometimes to the extent of a replacement of their own children), or they hate the animals very much to become their food. I’ve never heard the humans ate lizards so far, but I won’t take any chances (yet!)

My daily obsessions with humans lead me to start trying to imitate them in every aspect. The biggest problem so far is trying to imitate how they walk. Let’s face it; I’m not built with 2 long leggy features like humans are. All I have is 4 tiny legs with even tinier fingers. I’m made to crawl, not to walk.

That fact doesn’t stop me from trying, though. I kept wondering how to walk actually, until one day I came across a lovely giant lizard in the giant screen that humans call “TV”. In what seems like an advertisement (I’m not sure exactly what the lizard was selling), the lizard was shown to be able to behave like humans, such as talking, moving left and right, and, particularly, walking. The green giant lizard used the two back legs to walk only, and the two front legs were free to do something else. That gave me an idea and aspiration.

It is however, easier said than done. The first time I did it, I could only lift my front legs about 1 cm. No matter what I did, I couldn’t get more than that. It was very frustrating. Suddenly, an idea crossed my mind. Using a wall, slowly I lifted off my front legs while putting all my weights on my back legs. It was very weird feeling, but I kept trying.

For days I kept doing that, slowly trying to lift one leg off the wall. After a long period of time, finally I managed to stand with my two back legs. It was a very exhilarating feeling! It felt like I had accomplished something, or at least, a first step towards being human-like. I then started to learn walking with my two legs. Other lizards that saw me walking that way either shook their heads or even sneered at me, but I didn’t care. I knew I was on the right path, at least to be like the giant lizard in the TV.