THE WALK

LESSON ONE

I will try to take you with me,if you care to go.
Hold on to something familiar, a stone, a ring, a trinket in your pocket. Touch something you thought you knew; a dog, the rough bark of a tree,  but do not speak,  it could break the spell.

I went to the Lake, as I always do, in the sparkling morning.
A black and white Border Collie dashed madly for his masters’ green ball.
He returned it and flattened himself into the grass, as they always do, gleaming dark eyes watching for the next toss.

Again:  A black Border Collie dashed madly for his masters’ green ball.
He returned it and flattened himself into the grass, as they always do, gleaming eyes watching for the next toss.
This is what border collies do.

I breathed harder and harder as I walked up the crooked trail, stepping over gnarled roots and tears began rolling down with every gasp. I was crying, but why?
I was just like the dog,
Doing what I do each day without any awareness of an imprisoned existance.
I wag my tail, take my cofee with cream, lay down and wait for the ball, for the happy hour with wine and cheese or vodka and tobacco. I bask in the bliss of the aquisition, repeat.
What manner of being would I be if my mind could step outside its breeding?
A fierce wolf? A fawning pomeranian?
What if I could reimagine each of my forgone conclusions, rearrange every unconscious, habitual motion and unexamined notion as easily as I rearrange my furniture?
What if I could be other than me?