Saving Snails and Worrying About Justice
The unremarkable days that deserve to be written down
Tomorrow will be warmer than today, or so the forecast says. No thunderstorms, just a light breeze.
You walk your dog, as you do every morning, but it's quiet because it's Easter. You appreciate this silence, this solitude. It's not that you dislike other people, it's just that their robotic footsteps distract you from your thoughts. You're terribly uncomfortable with the presence of others forcing you out of your maladaptive daydreaming.
You slow down a little when you notice pigeons pecking at discarded food on the ground. You don’t want to disturb their meal, so you take the longer route through the field where the grass hasn't been cut. You think of Robert Frost's "Road Less Taken" and wonder if anyone else makes small detours, altering their path simply to allow birds their peace. You get annoyed when people deliberately run at pigeons or sparrows, delighting in their startled flight.
Yesterday you lifted a snail from the path, so that others wouldn't step on it. You could never hurt another human being, you can't even bear the thought of a snail being crushed after a rain shower.
You spend too much time worrying about justice and surfing the internet looking for collectibles to bid on. It feels like a strangely anachronistic pastime in 2025.
You finished reading Sylvia Plath's unabridged journals and you just ordered Pope Francis' autobiography. You heard about his death this morning, and it made you sad - those who leave their mark, and those who don't, both eventually fade. Death is indiscriminate. You wonder if people contemplate their mortality in their spare time, or if they only think about it when someone influential dies.
You start so many drafts that never see the light of day. You know this one has to, not because it's spectacular, but because it's real. Reality isn't always exciting - it's often dull and numbingly repetitive. But if you don't write about it, people will be misled into thinking that it's only the remarkable moments that deserve attention.
You still struggle with your writer's identity, or maybe you never had one to begin with, which is why every time you read a book you claim it feels strangely familiar. You find pieces of yourself in everything, and the world makes you feel inadequate for it. But who desires to be a fish confined to a bowl, with predetermined limits? Not even the fish itself yearns for such confinement, it desires the boundless ocean, to be a living, breathing part of the ecosystem. It is only man that captures these wonderful, untamed creatures for his own fleeting amusement.
But man also seals pistachios in recycled bags, sings melodies, imparts knowledge, seeks understanding, and yes, writes. Man is flawed, but also possesses qualities.
Your writing is terribly fragmented and discordant. Your essays can't even be called essays, and your endings are rushed and unimpressive. It's because you don't like to end things, or so you tell your partner when you come in after the 30-minute walk with your dog, the dodging of the pigeons, the rescue of the snail, and the long journey through your brain's synapses.
It’s time to start your day. But you don’t know how to start things either.
As usual, I enjoy reading your words. They flow so nicely, like watching an ankle-length skirt move captivatingly with the gait of its elegant wearer.
Diana, reading your words feels less like reading and more like remembering something I always knew but forgot how to say. And when you wrote, "...You wonder if people contemplate their mortality in their spare time, or if they only think about it when someone influential dies..." It's just strange how something can belong to everyone and still feel like a secret. I enjoyed every bit of this.💕