小林一茶 Says かたつぶりそろそろ登れ富士の山

Climb Mt. Fuji, Snail
Originally uploaded by Tokyorosa

This is not my snail. (Actually, I don't think this snail belongs to anyone. It's a wild, free-roaming snail.) I meant that this photo of a snail is not my photo of a snail, but Mr. Putty's photo of a snail. Mr. Putty takes the most amazing photos and we're friends, so I lean on that friendship to do things like steal his photos of snails.

I have an affinity for snails in part because I used to work in a lab that used snails. Yes, the work involved infecting the snails with parasites and then crushing the snails to harvest the parasites some time later, but it also involved caring for the little devils, feeding them, cleaning their tanks, moving their little egg sacs from place to place.

Sometime after that job, in a karma-corrective effort, I bought three snails to keep as pets. The new snails were giant snails, not the eighth- to half-inch dull gray snails, but enormous, beautiful two-inch aquatic snails. One was midnight black (and named "Krishna," the Sanskrit word for black), two were rich, sultry yellow ("Hare" the Sanskrit word for yellow). Eventually the two mated, and, as such things are wont to happen, their offspring were, yes, dull and gray.

P.S. Happy (belated) Birthday, Kazu! (Kazu is pictured here in Fukuyama Castle.)