Anteater crossing

Giant anteater from National Geographic

In Playa Guiones, the taxi picked us up at 1:00 AM for Linda's early morning flight. It was a strange trip at night over the dry bumpy road.

We chatted with Carlos, who was used to night driving, then lapsed into quiet, and dozed to Latin music, Linda in the front, I in the back.

Knowing there was virtually no traffic on the road, I was surprised to feel the car stop in what appeared to be the middle of nowhere.

"An animal..." But our driver drew a blank on the English name; he was Costa Rican.

"Armadillo?" I asked.

We peered into the dark road where a striped animal the size of a small dog was slowly crossing in front of us through what seemed to be a shallow ditch that went right across the road.

"No, oso hormiguero. It eats..." Again he was stuck for the English.

Linda had the answer. "Ants! It's an anteater."

I laughed and pointed. "It's using a kind of crosswalk -- an anteater crossing."

I pondered how the French word for bear -- ours, and the one for ants -- hormiga -- helped me unlock the Spanish name I'd just heard Carlos say. Literal translation -- ant-eating bear. While we waited for the creature to make its way across, he told us he had to be careful with night driving. There are lots of animals on the road. Dogs, cattle....and anteaters of course.

A few miles later, I was still thinking about the word. Then I realized I'd recognized it because it sounded like the French word for ant, fourmi.

And for a moment I was back at my daughter's elementary school concert, as she marched and sang enthusiastically with her classmates, "Nous sommes les fourmis...nous sommes tres petits, mais ensemble nous sommes formidables." We are small but together, we're a force to be reckoned with. Or something like that.