On a slow day

Have you ever actually seen a turtle crossing the road? Indeed a pitiful sight, an exercise in futility, surely to meet with shell-cracking, body-flattening disaster. Death by speeding rubber. But still, imagine that act of faith in the motion forward. Onward. Proceed at all costs to the other side.

Because I am slow to cross the road, because I am slow to read signs, even when the handwriting’s on the wall, because I am slow to say goodbye, troubled by closings and endings of all kinds, because I’m slow to write, a procrastinator by nature, because I’ve developed the habit of checking this blog from day to day and dropping my line or two, because habits die slowly, even when splattered on the road, here I am.

Here. Present. Hand raised. Eager to answer a question no one has asked of me. Ready. Notebook open. Seated in a classroom, where no one is taking attendance, where I am the sole student. Slow learner. Stringing sentences together. Writing for the sake of . . . writing. On a blog that I did not begin. Okay, let’s see how this goes. A turtle. Crossing the road.