Snail

Snail

For many years, our family lived in San Francisco near the busy intersection of Taraval Street and 28^th Avenue. Taraval is a major street from 19^th Avenue to Ocean Beach, so it is heavily traveled; ours was an especially hectic intersection. Streetcars rattled down the tracks of Taraval, and the post office was kitty-corner across Taraval from us.

One day I had dropped something at the post office and was walking back home across that busy intersection. When I was three quarters of the way across the street, I came upon a snail heading the same direction I was. He/she/it/they (how does one know?) had already made its way across three lanes of traffic, including two sets of tracks. Cars and streetcars, trucks, bicyclists, skate-boarders, and pedestrians were coming from all directions, including right toward the snail.

Now I’m not one who loves snails any more than anyone else does. I’ve been known to fling them out into the street to preserve my plants. However, I was so touched by this particular snail that I picked it up and carried it across the rest of the street. Then I put it onto a leaf.

I’ve often thought about that snail. Sometimes we can make it three quarters of the way across an impossible street, and sometimes we feel as lowly and unremarkable as the snail, just unable to finish the journey. Sometimes we simply need someone to pick us up and carry us the final distance. Friends are like this. Prayer is like this. Rest is like this. They help us across when our own energy, or the odds, turn everything that is rational against us. And this: God is with us….always.

In that instant, I truly loved this little guy.