I went back to Virginia for a long weekend with the Crows, our name for ourselves, four of us who’ve been friends since high school. Ah, the beloved James Madison High School, Class of 1976. We’ve been through our lives together: the boyfriends, the breakups, the weddings, the babies, the divorces, and everything in between.

We all met up at Lake Anna, an 18-mile-long manmade lake resulting from the damming of the North Anna and Pamunkey rivers to create a hydroelectric plant. So, at Lake Anna, there’s a warm side and a cold side. Warm because that side receives the treated hot water from the plant and cold because that water helps cool the hot water.

As typical, the weather was stinking hot and humid. We went out on the boat and it was glorious! Somewhere along the way we started talking about the trip to Africa two of us are taking. I expressed my trepidation about the “hippo boat ride” we’ll be taking on Lake Naivasha, discussing the tourist who’d gotten too close and was killed by a hippo.

One of the Crows said how she had little hippo soft toys for her kids years ago. Why do we anthropomorphize animals and tell our children these cute stories about dangerous animals? Is it a means to assert superiority? I’m always sad and quite outraged when humans disrespect the ferocity of animals–whether a house cat or a majestic tiger, a hippo, a rhino. Why do we think all animals are our objects, to use and abuse?

All this to say our trip to Kenya and Tanzania will be undertaken with great respect.