snails.

Memory 1: Way back in my childhood days when I found a worm on the road, I would pick it up and kiss it. Maybe I would carry it with me, or possibly return it to 'safe ground.' Whatever my motivations were, nowhere in my memory is any recollection of reasoning behind my actions.

Memory 2: One summer day while at the cabin, I woke up to screaming. Screams means panic. Screams are not funny. Especially when the scream is coming from is your mother, saying something along the lines of, "Why are there SNAILS in my KITCHEN!!!" Oh boy, just typing this still makes me laugh out loud. My mother ABSOLUTELY HATES slugs. Snails are equal to slugs in her eyes.

The previous day, Stacy and I had the grand idea of making a home for a little tribe of snails. We found a bucket for making sand castles and spiffed it up a bit with dirt, leaves and twigs. Not wanting anything to happen to the snails we innocently brought them into the cabin for a sleepover. Of course, we didn't think that snails would want to escape the walls of the castle. But they did, right into my mom's kitchen.

I bring up these memories because I have been running around town. My favorite loop is along a road I call 'the horse and cow road.' The view is so spectacular that it is easy to become lost in the low hanging clouds scattered around the mountains or the the colorful patchwork of trees lining the lake. Once in awhile, especially after a rain, I become distracted by the snails on the road (the snail population increases ten fold). The number of snails terrifies me. I fear my neon running shoes will unintentionally crush one. But I have yet to see a crushed snail and am starting to think that snails have anti-smashing force fields - or drivers are equally as cautious as me.

So last week I was feeling happy when I arrived back at my trailer until I looked down at my front step and saw for the first time, a crushed snail.

Can I blame the cat?