I got to hang out with Bill today. Bill is one of my very favorite people. Bill is my dear friend's little boy; Bill is two. Bill calls me Auntie Cars not because he can't say Carol and not because his mommy is my "real" sister. I'm Auntie cause that's what'd I'd be if the world made the connections I saw fit (helps that his mommy agrees) and Cars because, well because, I have cars. I don't have real live, grown ups can drive, cars laying about the yard. I do however have the cars that Bill likes. There are areas of the house that look a little like a Match Box wrecking yard, Bill loves it. As a result of these two things I am Auntie Cars.
There is such beauty in a person whom has not been commercialized. I can watch Bill for hours and never get bored with his discoveries. What is especially lovely about Bill is that he still believes "good" should simply be a fact of life.
Today Perris was getting her feet done so while that was going on Bill and I hung out. We found a slug crawling on the grass. We were actually headed to his store, a little play house, where he sells water (not really). We got distracted picking flowers for mommy when we (Bill) decided he needed the cart for the flowers. We had two dandelions, not a heavy load! The cart he wanted was in the longer grass so off we went. I saw the slug, it was flippin' huge and black. I have, honest to goodness, never seen a black slug. I googled it, they are kinda gross.
In any case I see this slug and point it out to Bill. We both knelt there, our collective butts resting on our feet, and discussed the slug. Bill said "What's that". I said "A slug, can you say slug". Bill says "Auntie bug".
It was close enough for us to go from there to Bill's version of what it was doing and Auntie Cars explaining that it was climbing and that we didn't want to touch or hurt it. Bill agreed and we sat there watching the slug, repeating the same questions:
1. What's that?
2. Where go?
I would say we spent five minutes on the slug.
It never occurred to me to kill the slug, it really never occurred to Bill to so much as disturb the slug. That belief that there is no reason to hurt another being just because you don't understand it is lost on "us" anymore.
If you really think about it, fear is almost always the basis of anger. Not being able to understand something scares "us", I think it is safe to say it scares the shit out of "us". "We" think we are pretty damned smart. Perhaps relate, or even empathize, is a better word then understand in this case, hard to say.
We didn't kill the slug, or touch the slug, we studied the slug and then left the slug to do whatever it was the slug was headed to do.
Sure it was just a slug, it could have been up to no good in the world of slugs, it could have been headed home to his family of slugs; we'll never know cause we left him alone.
It is just simple respect I suppose. Leo isn't just a dog, sure he's a dog but "just a dog" makes him sound less than deserving of humane treatment and simple respect. Just a dog leads one to believe that hurting him wouldn't matter as much as hurting a person.
I was going to go through the list of animals in the title however I do believe my point is made already.
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