The Really High Road

The question from my book study this morning was:
What would you label the road you are currently on in your life?
Seriously?  [Currently, all outbound routes are blocked; there was a seasonal pastel m&m issue?  No one is movin,' no one can get in or out].


Yesterday, I was asked by my boys, "please, can we watch this caterpillar get to the grass?"
Ever patient, I said, "just pick him up and carry him over, come on."
"No!  We wanna see him do it."

Poor thing.  He left a quaint squat of land to cross the preschool drop off area (survived the morning's wheel-dodging danger) and was now gunning full feet ahead.

We watched him like the three of us were on safari.  We knelt and crouched on the sidewalk, took a picture, stayed out of his Sun.  Our shadow distracted him.

We were locked now (with no commercial interuptions); there was a gulch he had to cross before he made it to his sweet victory [a strip of grass by a metal wall].  Deeply contemplating a strategy, as near as we could tell, he raised up half his body.  He was unsure.  He turned around, turned back, half turned again.  The three of saw how far he'd come.  It was so far, this one gulch couldn't stop him from the goal he'd set to attain.
"I wish we could tell him," my son said.

"Yeah, he's so close to the grass," said the other.

By this time, I was won over to the whole program by two people who had been on the soil of this earth five and three years. I helped, "actually, his body is long enough to cross.  If he's strong enough to hold half his body up, he could lift then put it down on the other side." 

"And still have six more legs on this side too."

(We were close).

"He should do it!"

Well, as it goes with people, so it must also go with caterpillars-you cannot tell them what to do.  They've got a plan they are literally sticking to, and because we are not him, we could not possibly understand neither goal nor motive. 

I watched him long enough, I got the gist.  He was an individual trapped by tentative nervose.  In support of his plan, I picked him up and put him in the grass strip.  Or rather, I tried, but he insisted instead, with sticky feet, to cling to a single strip of grass.
He didn't get it--instead of climbing down three inches to a place on earth he'd be entirely grounded, he climbed UP one strip of grass at a time.  When the weight of his body bent the grass blade, he reached another blade, climbed it, too, until it bent.  He was the head monkey of the caterpillars, and I started to see why he just walked away from the Eden across the preschool drop zone.  He had to prove something.  He was a movie in the making; The Coen Brothers would write and direct-an intoxicatinly exhuberante portrail. 
He could have always gone back, but only he knew the road he must take...[annd...scene].

We looked for him today, combed the grass a sec, lightly wondered what path he finally chose.  Home again, I sat down to address the question I ditched yesterday afternoon--'What is the name of my road?'  I do not know, but I think I can tell you how to find me:
Follow a little ponderous path, there'll be signs to let you know you're headed in the right direction, that merges into Back on Track Trail.  You'll come to a slight fork, ignore, "I Got This Rd" (it's a short cut, but it's not always cleared) instead go right onto the Flexibility Interchange, this will drop you in Energy Circle (be careful, you can easily miss the turn there), take the Adventageous Ave. exit.  When you reach the top of hill, take Harness Blvd" (be prepared though, you'll go through a great deal of traffic lights, but every once in a while someone will hit every green).  I'm on that street, going this way or that; you'll see me, or I'll see you.  But please call if you get in a jam.  I may be able to see just where you are.