Imagine you are in a little row boat. The air is thick with humidity and mosquitoes. The muddy water moves slowly, if at all, through the swamp grasses and mangroves. A pair of gleaming eyes and eighty jack-o-lantern teeth smile up at you. Do you smile back? Or do you scream...?
Meet Alligator! The granddaddy of all modern reptiles. Alligators have been around since the time of the dinosaurs and have changed very little. They can grow to more than 13 feet and weigh over 600 pounds. In the wild they even often live to be fifty years of age.
Alligators are a great example of patience. They will stay still for hours, lying in wait, preserving their energy, and waiting for their prey to swim into their grinning mouths. When needed though, they can move with lightening speed.
Healers across cultures, and centuries, have looked to Alligator as a symbol of strength, longevity and cunning. During dry seasons, they create small pools that provide a dependable water source for other animals. They feed on fish that would otherwise eat bass and other desirable species, thus they are one of nature’s greatest recyclers and essential to the ecosystems in which they dwell. People who want to contribute more to society would be wise to summon Alligator into their imaginings and make dream-fish offerings to it.
Alligators have long been associated with the cycle of life and death. Partially because of their efficiency in the act of the kill, but also because they are the eternal sentries of the waterways: nature’s boatmen who make their rounds, night and day, down the river Styx, that mythical boundary between this world and the next. If Alligator is one of your totems, you likely possess keen psychic and channeling ability: put it to good use!
Alligators are magnificent creatures with big hearts that take incredible care of their young and rarely attack humans, unless provoked. While you might not want to meet one while you are out swimming at night, study and honor them, and your own “gator-nature,” when it is safe to do so, and you will feel your own reptilian power grow to great lengths.
