Snake Guts

Snakes. Who doesn't love 'em?

My wife.

And the problem was planting the new flowers in the snake infested garden along the driveway. So, "Who you gonna call?"  Snake Busters, or Madi and Seneca.   Madi is our 23 year old daughter who not only is not afraid of snakes, bugs, spiders, etc., she loves them and catches them anytime she has a chance.  Good to have her with you, if you're Amy, and entering enemy territory.  Then there's Seneca - our 7-year-old Yellow Lab. She loves snakes, too. A little jumpy around them, but that adds to the fun. At least for her.

I received a call the other day from Amy about a snake encounter that eclipsed all our previous ones. She had Madi with her as they entered the danger zone. And yes, there were snakes. The big, slithery, flesh eating, venomous Garter snakes. Well, slithery.  In comes Seneca - fired up, barking, charging, jumping. And that's usually where it stops. Then things turned bad - for the snake. Seneca caught it in her mouth, probably unexpectedly, and by pure reflex, she shook.  Violently. Guts. Everywhere. Even some showered on Madi. Exciting times.

I really don't think Seneca had any intention of killing the snake. That's just not her nature, but maybe when she got it in her mouth, writhing, striking, she just, well, freaked out.  Dead snake. Kind of - they're pretty hearty. So I had to finish what Seneca unknowingly started when I got home.

So Seneca didn't mean it to kill it. But she did. Result:  dead snake.

This little episode really made me think about intentions and outcomes. Intentions matter, but outcomes do too, whether it was part of our intention or not.

And so it is with us. How often do we unintentionally offend, hurt, disrespect or even bully someone we care about? Yet the result is the same whether we intended it or not.  We must own it either way. "I didn't mean it" or "It wasn't my fault" doesn't cut it, unless we're a very young, immature kid or perhaps a Yellow Lab.  Neither knows any better. We should.