Knee Deep

Walt Disney had an answer for everything when it came to animals, except he couldn't teach our new pet, a toad, when to hold its tongue and back off.

Alone in the Arctic. Starving. Cold. Lonely. As long as we had our couch, our TV and each other, there'd be no tapping out.

In the middle of Winter, we find ourselves in a spot where our balance is shaky. We are in the in-between, the part that is drifting and loose as we wait for new beginnings. A toy robot, Mr. Machine, shows us what is happening in that space, and he stands ready to kick things into gear in the midst of our drift, the drift of Winter.

We get our share of snow dustings here in EvanspatchIndiana, little false starts, but the real stuff does crazy things to us whenit comes. It changes our DNA. We return to some primordial state. We shift into anxiety mode and believe it is our responsibility to add to the general sense of panic and mayhem in the community. We don’t know what to do exactly, but whatever it is, we will need a map and a bread and milk sandwich.

Everyone loves a dark horse. IU’s winning football season has swept everyone off their couches into the winning zone of state pride.  We buried our heads in some infertile turf over the last five decades, waiting and hoping for a winning season, and we are ready to show the world Hoosier Daddy.

What is up with the word “sick” anyway? I’m sorry but there was not a chance on God’s green earth that I was going to adopt that word when I had an entire history of awesome words to choose from. Yet,  2026 needed a different slant. Maybe it was time I abandoned my favorite exclamations for something really cool.

Sometimes we have to get very small to become available for the season of Christmas. If we don’t, we may miss that first hint of magic that is in the air and a small miracle that is within our grasp. 

Having your tonsils removed may be the first time we realized we don’t get to keep everything we get. Even so, I thought Show and Tell might delay the process, even celebrate it, when I brought what had been removed from my throat to school in a jar.

It stands to reason that the phrases “antique show” and“space technology” probably shouldn’t be used in the same sentence. Be that as it may, when a vintage astronaut suit I found turned into a wardrobe malfunction, I was calling Houston to tell them I had a problem.

The loud and the brash may tell us that we have much to fear. Yet just down the block the church bells chime softly, reminding us that hope is alive and singing. We can hear it if we open our front door and let it in.