Earth Day 2023: Going Slow to Go Faster

Photo credit : Chris McKay (April 22, 2023)

A few reflections and observations after an encounter with these two little speed demons, "Felix" and "Florence", on Îles des Soeurs in Montréal on Earth Day 2023.

1. At the risk of stating the obvious, snails move very, very, very sloooooooowly. Observing their Zen style choreography forces you to slow down and be very, very, very patient. Not such a bad thing, really.

2. Self-taught architects, snails seem rather adept in their choices of materials, colours, and form for the construction of their light weight and portable homes. Since the quality of their eyesight is supposed to be quite low and they only see in black and white, their design skills are rather commendable. All this without hand sketching, AutoCAD or Rhino 3D. Impressive!

3. Snails are hermaphrodites and have some rather eccentric and unique mating rituals involving throwing "love darts" at each other. Seriously, I'm not making this up. Please Google it. It does make you wonder if Cupid borrowed from snails for his arrow inspiration. No accusations, just wondering.

4. Snail dialogue is downright hilarious when you put words to mollusc romance scenes, especially when they have cute French accents.

5. The more I live, the more I am humbled and in awe of our complex ecosystem. Thank you, "Felix" and "Florence" for reminding me of this on Saturday, Earth Day 2023.

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* "Felix" and "Florence" are stage names to protect the true identities of the snails involved in this photoshoot. As they did not sign photo releases, this image is for research purposes only.