The mirrored reality under the water.

I was on a hike at University Falls recently with my kids and noticed a hollowed out stump. “I wonder who lives in that stump?” I said.

My 8 year old son says—without missing a beat—“oh, the Ty-tunk lives there.” The Ty-tunk? “Yes, it’s a kind of beetle. It’s super long and as big as me and its horn is almost as big as its body. Males have a blue iridescent horn and the females horn is black and not quite as long.”

He went on to tell me about a underground kingdom you entered through a stump that you had to have a secret key card to access, and about “tappoleans” and “frogpoleans” that lived in the pond we passed and how there was another reality in the mirrored surface we saw reflected.