I hated that slug. I didn't even know it. I'd never met it. But I hated it 'cos every morning when I woke up, there would be fresh slug slime on my radiator or on my shoes or on my carpet.
I don't know how it even found enough moisture to stay alive. Life must have been really tough for it. Dessication only a hairs breadth away. There's not that many slugs that could hack living in a house. But I didn't think of that. I hated this slug. And I'd never even seen it.
And today I trod on it. By accident. I looked down and what I mistook first off for a piece of pasta was a slug dying. It was a handsome slug, beautiful maybe, mantle mottled chestnut patterns on a military grey body. Little black stripes running around the foot meniscus. Instantly, I loved it. Instantly I respected it's tenacity, it's perseverance, it's raymearsesque survival in a land not made for it.
I carried the little body outside. I salted the hell out it just to make sure it was dead. I don't know why I did that. It was unresponsive anyway, but I wanted it to be dead, not dying slowly with its guts on the outside. I guess it was for me. The slug probably was too far gone to care. But I felt that maybe I was doing something to help. I'd hated it and turned down the option to love it, and now the option was gone. And until I was completely sure it was dead I was distraught. Why do I always want to save those that I can't? Why do I want to have that which I can't? Why do I love those that I can't?
It happens all the time: As soon as the option is taken away from me I *want*, *need* what it offered. I can't think of anything else until I snap out of it. For Alice it took two years (Three years, who am I kidding?). For my slug it took until I was totally sure it was dead. For Nick, maybe as long as Alice and my slug added together.
But yeah, just to say, angsty Grey is back. You've got me for a couple more years.
2 comments:
Remove my name from this blog. Do not tag my name in anything you write. A.H.
As you wish.
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