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24
Jul
2019
On a morning walk, I almost missed seeing a small garden snail crawling across a paved road.
Garden snails don’t belong on pavement. They’re too vulnerable. They carry a shell with them, but it’s no more protective than an eggshell. A car tire, or my foot, would crush it instantly.
I took a break to watch the little creature.
Its body was almost translucent. Its front end kept reaching forward; its hind end hung back, until it had to let go and suck itself back underneath that shell.
I wondered how the hind end felt about being dragged along to an unknown destination. Did it scream, “Whoa! Stop! Where are you taking me? I don’t want to go there!”
And did the front end, in fact, know where it was going? Can a snail possibly know in advance that lush green dewy grass lies on the far side of a paved road?
In my fascination with the snail’s mental processes, I failed to note whether this particular snail’s shell was left- or right-handed.
Categories: Soft Edges
Tags: Snails, Fibonacci, left-handed