I've loved snakes all my life but the older I get, the fewer opportunities I have to be with them. Today's intimate encounter with Kaa, a 30 year-old Ball Python who lives at the Ojibway Nature Centre in Windsor, Ontario, was one of those instances of unexpected magic.

My women's singing group--the Gaia Women of the Great Lakes Basin--was meeting there for our monthly day of song and sharing. Today we'd been invited to bring any song we wanted the group to sing. I brought Carolyn McDade's "Serpent Song." The words are:

In the places that reek
of impossibility
The serpent of life coils.
She crawls upon
the swollen stone,
Crawls upon the
swollen stone,
Crawls upon
the swollen stone,
and loosens
her only garment.

After we'd sung it several times, we shared what this song meant to us personally. I spoke of my recent experience of preparing my self portrait series for publication in Burn Magazine...certainly an example of shedding my skin.

Kristen, who was staffing the Ojibway Nature Centre today, heard us singing. She asked one of our women if we'd like for her to bring a snake into the room while we sang this song. I was intrigued by her offer and talked with Kristen during lunch. I told her about my self portrait project and asked if I could hold the snake and take some photos. She said "Sure."

Well, Kaa and I spent a full half hour together. In my opinion, he is one of the sweetest-natured creatures on the planet. I felt like I'd died and gone to heaven. And I got over 40 photos.

Oh, we never know what a day will bring. How I love life!