Slug

I live in a 110-year-old Victorian flat in North Beach, San Francisco. It’s literally made of redwood trees which is very romantic. Of course, being that old, it has many quirks. The doors have warped over the years and there’s a big gap at the bottom of our back door from the sunroom into the garden. It is quite a large gap, and so we block it with a door snake. Happily, there’s still enough room for an illusive and intrepid slug to sneak into our home every night.

It’s hard for me to describe how much joy this slug brings me. I know that sounds strange. I’ve only seen it once. I know it’s probably not possible that it’s been the same slug over the many years I’ve lived here, but please don’t comment or message me with the average lifespan of slugs. I don’t want to know. To me, this brave shell-less terrestrial gastropod mollusc is full of wanderlust and moxie. He leaves his family each night because he knows that somewhere there is more.

I don’t know what slugs eat, but I’m certain there’s not more of it on our sunroom floor than there is in the garden right outside our door. Don’t tell me this slug is driven by anything as animalistic as hunger. He is curious about our family and our way of life. He wants to know what these chairs and this table and my husband’s flip flops can tell him about the true nature of the universe.

Each morning, I check the sunroom and squeal with delight to find the evidence of his nocturnal quest. A slime trail extends up and over the door snake, across the floor, in and out of my son’s left rain boot, around our potted benjamin ficus. The other night, I left my jacket on top of the storage bench in our sunroom, only to find a shiny glistening streak across the hood. I can’t be angry with you, slug! I’m too impressed and inspired. Sometimes he goes all the way into the kitchen! Can you imagine? There is a step with several ridges connecting our sunroom and kitchen. It is small by human standards, but a veritable Kilimanjaro for a slug. Nevertheless, he pushes on, further than the day before and always with the wherewithal to know when, alas, it is time to slink away and back through the crack in the door before the sun rises.