Moi Reminds Me How Touch-Me-Nots Actually Work

July 11, 2010.  Sunday.

Situation:  I wake up about 8, my alarm clock, which I had set for that time, frozen at 7:50.  Moi is milling around but hasn’t taken Mway for a walk.  I tell Moi I’ll take her for her morning walk, but I don’t know why, since I’ll probably take her for a walk when I get home from work and I have preparatory work to do before leaving.  By the time we get to the pig pen, I decide just to take Mway to the clearing (Moi seldom takes Mway for a full morning walk during the summer anyway).  I throw the stick from one end of the clearing, and at one point as I’m backing up in my spot, I feel my foot sink and realize I’m stepping on one of the evergreen saplings Moi has planted.  Last night, when Moi and I were discussing the dry, hot weather, I mentioned how the touch-me-nots had come out early and how the flowers were not springing at the touch of my fingers this year.  “That’s because it’s not the flowers that do that,” Moi smiled, “It’s the seed pods, which come out after the flowers.”  I wince.  “That’s right,” I say, “I should’ve known that.”  I have to leave for work by 10, but I anticipate taking Mway for a full walk this evening.

States of the Path, Creek, the Fetch:  I get home, I don’t know what the time is, must be the usual time, close to the usual time, have it in mind to take Mway, the dog, for a walk, at the usual time, for a Sunday, for it is Sunday, and close to the time, the usual time, when I take Mway, the dog, for a walk, on Sundays.  Moi says something, don’t remember now what, something about phone calls, or about making calls, something about the work she’s been doing, having to do with phones and calls, but I don’t recall exactly what now.  Out on the path, see Mway following, we’re on her walk now, our usual Sunday walk, the two of us, together more or less, though I’m paying more attention to where I’m going, stumbling down the path, one foot before the other, hoping Mway is following, depending on Mway following, for this is her walk, not mine, brushing away weeds, a briar here, a goldenrod there, whatever is next here or there, brushing them away, so one foot can go before another, one after another, in the usual fashion, as we usually do, on a Sunday.  See the fruit of the jack-in-the-pulpit, white, green gone white, once green gone white, a bony white, see other plants, many other plants, but don’t have names for them, or rather, do have names for them, but just don’t think of their names just now, the names for the many plants, which have names, many of them which I know, but just don’t think about them now.  That is the state of the path.  Enough for that now, and on to the state of the creek.  The pathetic creek, or rather, what should more accurately be called, the pathetic run.  Not to be confused with the manner in which I am moving, for that is definitely a walk, or at least a stumble, not a run, but a run in the sense of something less than a creek, in the category of things having to do with running water, and not of moving humans, water if it is moving usually being said to be running, but not necessarily in a run, for water can run, not just in a run, but also in a creek, or in a river, or in a pipe, or out of a faucet, or down a drain, whenever water is moving it seems that it is running, or at least not ever walking, even if it is just a trickle, even if it is just a drip.  For we never talk about water walking, or at least I never talk about water walking, and I think it’s safe to say, if I never talk about water walking, neither do you, for you and I, we pretty much speak the same language, and use the same words, you and I, whoever you are, whoever you are, if you are reading this, I’m pretty certain we speak the same language, more or less.  And that language, which we both speak, more or less similarly, never, to my knowledge, in all its varieties, and in all its permutations, in the course of all its history, from the first utterance of he who, or she who, first retched up a word that, in the course of history, could be said to be of the same language that you and I speak, more or less, down to the last utterance, or rather most recent, that is the latest utterance, of he, or she, who puked up a word in this said language, which could be considered the same, never, to my knowledge, in all that time, during all that history, for all those utterances, and many utterances there must have been, and a great variety of utterances, dealing with a great many subjects, from a great many perspectives, in a great variety of circumstances, never, to my knowledge, has that language compelled some one who spoke it to say, in reference to water, that it is walking.  Not that some one who speaks this language, either you or I, or some one else, one of our friends, say, or one of our enemies, for that matter, not that some one, be it a friend or enemy, or neither a friend or enemy, may not have said, upon some occasion in the course of the long history of this language, when confronted with say, a trickle of water, or a drip of water, and asked to describe it, may not have said, about the water, that it is walking, rather than running.  For just as one would normally say, when face to face with water moving at a certain pace, or rather rate, that that water, moving at that certain rate, is running, one could conceivably say, when face to face with water moving at a lesser rate, water that, in a word, is not running, that that water is, not running, but rather walking, one could conceivably say this, yes.  But such an utterance, if one were to say it, would not be a normal locution in this language that you and I, and this some one, speak, but would rather be an unusual locution, in the form of a metaphor, and however conceivable, not necessarily a likelihood, let alone an actuality, and more likely it has been, in the course of the long history of utterances of this language that you and I, and other people, speak, more likely it has been that, when faced with water that is not running, you and I, and these other people, have been content to say that it is not running, or that it is merely trickling or dripping, as the case may be.  As to the state of the creek, I am content to say, as I’m sure you are content to hear, as anyone else is probably content to hear, that the water is just lying there, as it has been for some time, in puddles, whether prone or supine, it matters not.