Later that day, a insignificant incident became cosmic.  While at the dump, I saw a new born vole (black back-gray belly) struggling to walk, its legs too weak to propel it.  The vole rolled onto its back as its legs could not support it, belly up in the hot sun. Of course that was death for the vole who had probably crawled away from its mother's teets or away from the cover the mother had found.  I thought a moment whether I ought to step on it. It was perhaps 2 inches long. Instead I left it to die as it rightfully should.  Why this bothered me I can't say.  After all this was a garbage dump and I'd seen many rats galumphing before which only brought out an instinctive repulsion for rodents. I'd been trying to rid our yard of pesky chipmunks. Why such compassion for this vole, who by this time has died.  I can't say, except to express my gratitude for never having had to kill another person for in this fragile little rodent, I saw life, struggling, riggling to survive and I felt love for life, even a doomed vole's tiny being.