(last edited on April 29, 2014 at 1:26 am)
SUMMARY: In the interest of doing something different today, I tweeted a request for a silly idea to write about. This post is a collection of musings about levitating clams, in response to DIYSara’s quick response.Today, not quite sure what to write about on the blog, I asked the Twitterverse if they had any ideas of a hopefully-silly nature. DIYSara was the first to rise to the challenge:
Write about the quest of all fresh water clams to mutate into high beings that can levitate.
Awesome. I don’t even know what that means, so I’m just going to free-associate for a few minutes. First of all, let me consider the implications behind the statement:
- All fresh water clams apparently are possessed of consciousness, a fact of DIYSara’s world that had escaped me previously.
Said clams are on a quest, which makes me think that clams are much more moral that I would have given them credit for. Quests are associated with crusades, and crusades are waged for higher principles. Is there some threat to fresh water clams? Is their habitat threatened by long-necked mussels and other invading mollusks?
The object of the quest seems rather advanced: levitation. I could take this literally or figuratively, but the end result should be some form of “elevation” from their previous status. Perhaps levitation is merely an extension of the clam’s dream to move without legs, fins, and arms. I think clams propel themselves by flapping their shells to jet water, which is a kind of random way to go. Levitation would be a far grander, more controlled means of locomotion. I can just picture an entire group of clams, dissatisfied with their current locale, levitating grandly from their watery beds and moving like a school of fish. Would they levitate just within the water, or levitate above its surface?
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p>Numerous other questions come to mind. Is there a Clam Leader? Where did the quest come from in the first place? Is there a hidden agenda? Why levitate, and not evolve useful hands with opposable thumbs? And let’s presume that the quest itself is deemed achievable in the collective consciousness of all fresh water clams. Could it be that clams believe they are descended from UFOs observed in the isolation of fresh water streams and lakes? Are all clams part of a fragmentary consciousness that is tenuously held together in a network of linked minds? The theory that speaks to me is one that there is a Prime Clam, and there is a fragmentary history of the Prime Clam that is thinly-held in the consciousness of fresh water clams bubbling to themselves around the world’s river and lake beds. The Prime Clam, it is believed by all freshwater clams, descended from the sky and seeded the prehistoric oceans with life, though “belief” is perhaps too strong a word. It’s a kind of belief that is subconscious, a kind of dreaming awareness that lurks beneath the day-to-day drudgery of being a clam, much the way a house cat dreams of being a mighty hunter as it sleeps, paws twitching as he relives his grandest ancestral moments. When the clams are sleeping, they dream of rising from the Earth once more and taking to space to seed another planet with life from the bottom up.
Comments? Let’s jam!
5 Comments
As a resident of the Great Lakes I must say…You fool. Don’t you realize you have been brain washed by the forces of clamdom. Theirs is nothing more than insidious plot for world domination. I can tell you that they have wiped out most of the local species already and are turning their sights on man once they finish their war for the fresh water realm.
From Wikipedia: “Since colonizing the Great Lakes, they have covered the undersides of docks, boats, and anchors. They have also spread into streams and rivers nationwide. In some areas they completely cover the substrate, sometimes covering other freshwater mussels. They can grow so densely that they block pipelines, clogging water intakes of municipal water supplies and hydroelectric companies.
Also, as their shells are very sharp, they are known for cutting people’s feet, resulting in the need to wear water shoes.
Zebra mussels are also believed to be the source of deadly avian botulism poisoning that has killed tens of thousands of birds in the Great Lakes since the late 1990s”
First the water then the land then the sky (birds). They are sharpening their toxic powers.
Also note ” Since adult zebra mussels can survive out of water for several days or weeks if the temperature is low and humidity is high” Their invasion of our realm has already begun.
Its possible they have infiltrated twitter already and DIYSara is one of them or their agent.
You have been warned!! Stop the dread clam threat today.
Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zebra_mussel
Joe G: Holy moly!! One can not assume ANYTHING these days! My idyllic days of innocence have come to an end.
LOL. Beautiful. Is this what you were doing, sitting out there in the sun with your index cards?
Perhaps the sun was getting to you…or maybe this brilliant inspiration can become a first-person-shooter video game!
Just think of the possibilities:
“Call of Duty: Stop the Clams”
“Modern Warclam”
“HALO 5: Walking on Broken Clamshells”
I’d better leave it at that…
I suddenly have an uncontrollable urge to create a cartoon clam. And I’m hungry now.
Two thoughts…
1) Hello…have you forgotten about scallops? They levitate and move around the ocean floor…been doing it for millions of years…those fresh water clams are so…80’s!
2) I liked your vision of living in a sea bed of clams. I read a similar type of experience recently in a book called, The Host, by Stephenie Meyer. She wrote The Twilight series (yes, the vampire series. Yes, I read those too!).
The Host is about an alien race that invades planets and lives inside the planet’s most developed species (the host). They travel the galaxy, finding new planets and hosts, eventually taking over the planet, changing the creatures into peace-loving, kind replicas of themselves (mentally, not physically). Once invaded, the planet becomes a destination for other aliens back home – similar to Junior Year Abroad but the aliens can decide to stay and live in the host if they choose. The clam scenario reminds me of one of the planets they conquer. On this planet, the species is plant-like, stationary, and they share one common “brain” with millions of individual voices that hum to each other.