01x02 - Gator

[bunniefuu]

NARRATOR: What
you're about to see

may be dangerous,
ill*gal, unethical,

petty, misguided, immoral,
and most definitely stupid.

But it's also all true.

Hmm. Sort of.

♪ [TENSE MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

ERIC MERDA: So, I
ventured into the woods,

and I come across this lake.

The water looked inviting.

[BIRDS CHIRPING]

ERIC: So, I was
swimming on my back.

There's three stars
triangulating.

And I said, "That looks an
awful lot like a gator."

It's the first time I realized

there might be
alligators in the lake.

I got scared. I look
over, sure enough.

[SHRIEKS]

If you never wake,
you can never dream.

But if you die,

you're never gonna
have a nightmare.

You've gotta live that
nightmare to get through it

- to have a dream.
- ♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪

If any... any of that at
all makes sense to anybody,

you're twice as crazy as I am.

[LAUGHS]

♪ [EERIE MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

I get to maybe be on TV. If not,
I get to at least act like it.

Look at these guys.
We're filming each other.

[LAUGHS]

- How y'all doing this morning?
- CREW: Good, how you doin'?

Good. Good, man.
I'll shut mine down.

That's just something for
the family right there.

Man, you know, I... I
haven't been out here

since I lost my arm.

It was down that way somewhere.
I came back across the fence.

It was over here where
I jumped through.

My name's Eric Merda. I was
born in Cleveland, Ohio.

I moved down to Florida,

probably when I was
five, six years old.

I would say I'm
definitely a Florida Man.

[CHUCKLES] Not the
sharpest tool in the shed,

but I'll stab you with the
sharpest tool. [LAUGHS]

♪ [“OLD COWBOY SONG” BY
RICHARD A. GALEENER PLAYING] ♪

Let's put the facts out there.
I was not doing well. [LAUGHS]

♪ Let me sing you
An old cowboy song ♪

I just lost my girl.

♪ The kind of song Where
you can sing along ♪

[GROANS]

ERIC: I was getting
bored of my life.

- I was getting bored of my job.
- sh*t!

ERIC: I was fixing sprinklers.

[SCREAMS]

♪ Let me sing you
An old cowboy song ♪

ERIC: I just didn't
care anymore.

♪ [SONG CONCLUDES] ♪

[GROANS]

Just sick of everything,
sick of life in itself.

♪ ["RUNNING WILD" BY
SURGE FRANKLIN PLAYING] ♪

Ended up driving south on


♪ Running wild, rolling free ♪

ERIC: I didn't know
what to do with myself.

I'd never been alone before.

What do you do with
that kind of freedom?

Eric, you know, he felt
like he never had enough.

It became a search
for fulfillment.

I'm trying to do
something different.

I'm trying to find myself again.

♪ [SONG CONCLUDES] ♪

ERIC: Seeing the turn in...

I was like, "Never
been there before."

♪ ["4AM AT THE BORDER" BY
CAVENDISH MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

ERIC: I turned in,

drove down here
to the boat ramp.

There's a dumpster down there.

Oh! Hell, yeah.

ERIC: So I started throwing
my garbage into the dumpster.

And I seen garbage laying
around the dumpster.

I seen it lined up
along the fence line.

Like, this is where
people hang out.

Like, why would you want
this kind of stuff there?

So I start picking that
up. I was on a mission

to try to help
clean up the world.

♪ [SONG CONCLUDES] ♪

WADE: Ugh! We were
down here, uh,

on a Sunday,
throwing horseshoes.

Saw a strange fellow just
kind of walking around,

picking up little bits of trash,

and putting them in
little piles everywhere.

♪ [SOFT MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

ERIC: I was trying to
make piles of garbage

throughout the woods,
'cause it's all through

back there, it's garbage, man.

♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪

♪ [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

ERIC: And I noticed
there was this fence.

Something was strange
about this fence.

That fence...

represented a border
that I wanted to break.

The real freedom
was out there, man.

That's where your freedom is.

That's your freaking
America, out there.

That's why I went
over that fence,

to go find a new me.

That fence was me
crossing the line.

- ♪ [MUSIC CONCLUDES] ♪
- ["ERIC" GRUNTS]

Boy, am I good at crossing
the line. [LAUGHS]

It's kind of what I do.

It's definitely a huge
part of what I do.

- ♪ [THRILLING MUSIC PLAYING] ♪
- He kind of meandered off

and walked over to the
woods over there, and uh,

he crawled over the fence,

crawled under the fence,

and then crawled
back over the fence.

And then off in
the woods he went,

and we never saw him again.

ERIC: The swamp feels like
it just kept calling me.

I wanted to make
the swamp my b*tch.

I said, "f*ck it."

Kept going deeper
back into the woods.

And I tried to barrel my
way through it like a bull.

Ah, sh*t.

ERIC: And then keep
going. Go underneath...

- [GROANS]
- Climb on, go around.

I get probably halfway
through that brush.

I have no clue where I
am. Cut from head to toe.

Been out here a couple
of hours already.

[GROANS, PANTS]

♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪

Do I go back? Do I go forward?
I didn't really know, man.

So I moved forward.

♪ [TENSE MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

ERIC: Nighttime comes.

[GROANS]

♪ [EERIE MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

ERIC: And now, I come
across this lake.

[BREATHES HEAVILY, GRUNTS]

[GROANS]

ERIC: I'm cut from head to
toe, and I'm just thinking...

"The water looked inviting."

I'm a Florida Man, I
can swim. [CHUCKLES]

And I've got my
boots in my hand,

heavy, wet. I'm trying to
swim with them in one arm.

So now, I'm stuck
in the middle of it.

And the boots are drowning me.

So, these boots go to
the bottom of the lake,

along with the pants.

I'm swimming forward,
I'm swimming backwards.

I went underwater a
couple of times, man.

I... I dove down to
see how deep it was.

This is the first
time I realized

there might be
alligators in the lake,

which is pretty stupid
for a Florida Man.

And it should have been the
first thing I thought about.

JUSTIN MATTHEWS:
There's a lot of gators

out there at Lake Manatee.

Sometimes when you go
out there around dusk,

if it's warm, you
can see 20 heads

sticking out of the
water out there.

♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪

- Can I take a picture of y'all?
- CREW: Oh, yeah, sure.

Cool.

My name is Justin Matthews.

I'm the founder of
Matthews Wildlife Rescue.

I'm from Bradenton, Florida.

I've lived here all my life.

I've only been out
of the state once.

♪ [OMINOUS MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

JUSTIN: And you need to
know if you live in Florida,

when you're looking
at any wild animal,

you don't want to
interact with them.

ERIC: So, I was
swimming on my back,

looking up at the stars,

just as if I was
at the beach, man.

I look over, sure enough.

[SHRIEKS]

The alligator's, like,
a foot and a half,

maybe two feet away from me.

I'm looking dead in
this thing's eye.

Man, that camera's further away
from me than that alligator was.

[SHRIEKS]

And I went to freestyle swim.

Before my right arm even
touched the water down,

that alligator had a
hold of my forearm.

["ERIC" YELLS]

ERIC: He's got my
forearm in his grip,

and I got my arm over
his ribs, trying to pull.

I don't want this
thing to roll on me.

That's how gators
k*ll their prey.

They do a death
roll on the bottom.

- [SCREAMS]
- [LAUGHS]

We can roll, but we ain't
gonna do the death part.

[LAUGHS]

Well, the gator, when
he grabbed his arm,

I'm sure you heard a crunch.

[SNAPS]

My arm bent backwards.

I just kick as hard
as I possibly can.

Push this thing
up out the water.

He takes me down, I
push it out again.

He takes me back down,
I push it out again.

And then it just
ripped it off of him.

And the gator took
off, wagging his tail,

big old bone in his mouth,

and a smile on his face,
just like a little chihuahua.

[CLEARS THROAT] You
want me to get my gator?

[ALLIGATOR GROWLING]

JUSTIN: Yeah, he's warning me.

[LAUGHS] Come on.

Come on.

She just peed on me. Yeah.

This is Miranda.
She's an alligator.

I've only had her
for about a week

and she's bonding
with me really good.

- [CHUCKLES]
- ♪ [QUIRKY MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

[BLOWS RASPBERRY]
You doing okay?

You gonna rip my
nose off? No? Okay.

If you got your arm bit
off by an alligator,

you're probably
gonna bleed to death.

I mean, adrenaline is, uh...

It's an amazing thing.

It makes you do
superhuman things.

♪ [INTRIGUING MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

["ERIC" GASPS, PANTS]

At this point, I assume I'm
bleeding all over the place.

I have no clue how
I'm not already dead.

[WHIMPERS, PANTS]

♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪

ERIC: Finally found
some solid land,

trying to sleep,
sleeping on and off.

I'm getting eaten up by
ants, one arm, butt naked.

Probably in shock.

Waiting for the grasses
to start parting,

'cause this
alligator's stalking me

like it's a lion or
something, right?

[BREATHES HEAVILY]

[ALLIGATOR GROWLING]

ERIC'S MOM: Hey, Eric.

♪ [DRAMATIC MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

Mom?

God sent me here, Eric.

Hey, Mom!

I do believe, spiritually,
my mother came down,

and took my arm to save my life.

She seen me on the wrong
road and she had to do it.

I took your arm
to save your life,

because you're on
a really bad path.

"ERIC": [SOBBING]
Thank you, Mom.

ERIC: At the end of the day,

my arm had to be
taken to save my life.

And who better to do
it than my own mother?

ELISSA BENSON: Ooh! Somebody's
got a lot of energy in here.

Who is that?

CREW: Who do you think it
is? Is there a way to tell?

You...

have a high energy content.

- My name is Elissa Benson.
- ♪ [QUIRKY MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

I'm a hypnotherapist,

and I specialize in
past life regression.

[DINGS]

ELISSA: The reason
that we are born

and come to Earth
is to try and raise

our vibration with
each lifetime.

I've had a lifetime in Atlantis.
I've had a lifetime in Egypt.

Every part of history
that you can imagine,

I have seen.

Let me ask. May I ask
for somebody else?

♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪

So, that's a yes. Okay, stop.

May I ask for Eric?

These are my guides
answering me through this.

Stop.

Is Eric's belief
that the alligator

was his mother true?

No, was his fantasy,
which is what I suspected.

- PRODUCER: You think?
- Didn't want to say.

No, because it's
not for me to say...

- PRODUCER: Yeah.
- that you're having a fantasy.

- PRODUCER: Oh, yeah.
- Okay.

We can feel things that
aren't true. [SCOFFS]

How many of us have believed
things that aren't true?

"Oh, he really loves me."
[CHUCKLING] Yeah, right!

♪ [GENTLE MUSIC PLAYING ] ♪

I do not believe
that a human's soul

or their body or...

or any way can go when you
die, I don't believe you're...

go inside an animal, and
then you're that animal.

I don't believe that at all.

My aunts, uncles, and friends,
they like to argue with me,

and say, "It was not your mom,
this was a terrible tragedy,"

and all of that, and I respect
that opinion, and I agree.

It... it is a terrible thing.

"Tragedy"? I don't
know about that, man.

We may never know what
happened out there.

Sometimes I don't want to
know what happened out there.

I do know one thing, is
he fought, every day,

'cause he wanted to live.

♪ [DRAMATIC MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

ERIC: Been missing my arm,
going on towards a day now.

ERIC: Nothing to eat.

I'm done. It's not fun no more.
That's it, the fun part's over.

Hello? Thought I
heard something.

I'm trying to walk
through the swamp.

Things sticking and poking me.

Paranoid out of my freaking
mind of this damn gator, man.

Alligator, where are you?

Finally came out of there
into an orange grove,

where I tried to eat one
of the green oranges.

I thought about taking honey
from some man-made beehives,

'cause I'm, like, starved
and I'm thirsty as heck.

I found, I believe,
three separate ATVs.

I was trying to hotwire them
to find a way out of there.

And I climbed a
tree with one arm!

[LAUGHS] And I'm waving at
helicopters and airplanes,

and screaming at
the top of my lungs.

[BIRDS SQUAWKING]

ERIC: I was ready to
give up, you know,

I'm legitimately looking
for vultures at this point.

Oh f*ck, they're circling me.

DENNIS: I suspect
that the bleeding,

just because the way
his arm was mangled,

it probably crushed him enough
to where it slowed down.

I mean, I... I don't
see how you could live

for two and a half days
not going into shock

with your arm bit off,
lost in the woods.

It's a miracle they found him.

I don't know how
he's still alive.

He's lucky to be alive.

He's lucky they didn't drag
him down and drowned him.

You know, then they would have
finished off the next day.

♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪

What's crazy is how vividly

I remember all this
stuff, you know?

That sure looks like it
might be the cut fence.

That's the kind of water
I was dipping my hand in

and trying to drink.

I mean, could you imagine
for three days laying there,

with no arm, no medical care,

taking your hand and
just sipping water?

Sometimes in straight mud...

♪ [EERIE MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

ERIC: trying to
filter it through...

and then just drinking it?

[SIGHS DEEPLY]

I mean, how bad do you
want to live? [LAUGHS]

[GROANS]

ERIC: I probably only
moved a hundred yards

that third day, I bet you.

Didn't move barely any.
"I'm dead, man. I'm dead."

♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪

With a giant open
wound? [CHUCKLES]

"f*ck it, I'm gonna
lay here and die."

♪ [DRAMATIC MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

ERIC'S MOM: Hey,
Eric. Hey, Eric.

Hey, Eric. Hey, Eric.

Hey, Eric. Hey, Eric.

ERIC: Wait...

There's a beer
bottle on the ground.

Where did that come from?

[GROANS]

Dude, I can't be
far from that fence.

Somebody threw that beer
bottle over the fence.

[GROANS]

I seen civilization once again.
I knew I was making it out.

I knew I was right there.
There's no way I'm giving up.

I can't have but 50 feet to go.

[GROANS]

That beer bottle was hope, man.

[SCREAMS]

- ♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪
- ♪ [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

[LAUGHS]

"Let's get the f*ck out
of this swamp, man."

"ERIC": Hey! [GROANS] Hey!

RICK: I was leaving
this parking lot...

"ERIC": Hey!

- RICK: driving up this way...
- "ERIC": Hey!

RICK: and I got up right
to about this location,

- and I heard somebody scream...
- "ERIC": Hey!

"Help, help, help!"

Hi, I'm Rick, and I was
the one that found Eric,

with the, uh... with his arm
taken off from an alligator.

["ERIC" SCREAMS, GROANS]

He was totally naked. He
had swamp muck all over him.

And I said, "Bro, an
alligator got my arm!"

He said, "Holy sh*t!"

I yelled, "Holy sh*t,
holy sh*t, holy sh*t."

Holy sh*t, holy sh*t, holy sh*t!

I said, "You got
any water, man?"

You got any water, man?

Only thing I asked him,

"No, don't call the
ambulance. Don't call nobody."

"Give me some damn water."

- ♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪
- ♪ [SOMBER MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

He calls the ambulance.
I lay on the ground, man.

I know my journey's over. I
know what I just accomplished.

I get it. I'm like, "Holy f*ck!"

I apologize for the language,
but holy f*ck me twice!

You know, it's the
freakiest thing

I've ever seen in
my entire life.

Uh, I hope I never see
anything again like this.

I didn't sleep for a
few nights after this.

It was pretty traumatic.

Yeah, standing here,
looking in the woods,

I could still see Eric.

- Um, I could see his blue eyes.
- ♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪

I could see him naked.

- [LAUGHS] Unfortunately.
- ♪ [MELANCHOLY MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

It's all I wanted, man.

- And then you came through.
- I don't know how you survived,

'cause the heat was
brutal those days.

Man, I had it made in the
shade. Look at all those trees.

- [LAUGHS]
- Wow. But it was hot.

I went swimming
when I wanted to.

I mean, man, I was just
living the tropical dream.

- [LAUGHS]
- Yeah.

- Whatever you wanna call it.
- [BOTH LAUGH]

Yeah, I mean, it was a
tropical nightmare, brother.

- Yeah.
- No, man, I'm so...

- Thank you.
- Hey.

- Thank you, seriously.
- You're welcome.

I'm part of this swamp.
The swamp's part of me now.

My arm's never leaving here.

It's been eaten up.
It's been sh*t out.

And it's in this lake somewhere.
It's in those woods somewhere.

♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪

Circle of life, man. I mean,

it's... I... I'm part
of this swamp now,

and the swamp lives within me.

PRODUCER:

I know it's gonna
sound crazy, man,

but I want to go again.

[CHUCKLES] I wanna go
again. I know that's crazy.

I know that's absolutely
f*cking insane.

[BREATHES HEAVILY] I am so ready
to run back there right now,

and just go get it one
more time, man. [CHUCKLES]

PRODUCER:

I don't know.

I don't know, man. It's
something... It's just...

It's, like, calling me, man.

You know, like, I got the
call of the wild in me, man.

Forty-three-year-old
Eric Merda says

he was reborn on July 17th

after losing his right arm
in an alligator attack.

He says he now has a
new calling in life.

♪ [GENTLE MUSIC PLAYING] ♪

GROUP: I'm in the swamp.
The swamp is in me.

I'm in the swamp.
The swamp is in me.

ERIC: I'd like to be
a motivational speaker

just because I
probably dug myself

out of more crap
than most people

will ever even
dream of being in.

He has been, in a weird
way, a spiritual guy.

It did enlighten him
to the little things

in life that he still had.
And he doesn't have much.

He doesn't have much
money to his name,

but he became happy.

He bounced off that
and became, you know,

this different
Eric, this new Eric.

- ♪ [MUSIC FADES] ♪
- If a piece of sh*t like me...

[CHUCKLING] ...can come
out of something like that,

I know you can.

'Cause ain't nobody a
bigger piece of sh*t

than I am. [LAUGHS]

♪ ["DOG GONE SHAME" BY
LOU SHIELDS PLAYING] ♪

♪ Well, I'm a rolling
And a running fool ♪

♪ Have to roll away, well ♪

♪ Left town on a midnight train
And traveling like a man ♪

♪ Don't you know I'mma
thinking On you, loving on... ♪

I've been here since 1980.

I love it here because
I like the heat.

If anybody wants

a past life aggression...
uh, regression,

I will give you a
half price deal.

I'm normally 250, and
I'll do it for 175.

♪ Looking out At a
lonely night sky ♪

♪ Heading on west, I say, yeah ♪

♪ Left town on a midnight train
And traveling like a man ♪

♪ [SONG CONCLUDES] ♪