"Yell that one out when you get it" she said in what she considered her most calm and gentle tone. Her calculations were wrong though. What she considered calm and gentle still seemed animated and intense to her audience.

By this grade and age most children have been trained to raise a hand to answer class questions or request the floor.

She began realizing more and more that she spent her days within a room of tiny robots, in a building of tiny robots, in a town of various types of robots... situated in a galaxy of dust that accumulated on the surface of the Great Petrie Dish.

This was not where she wanted to be.

All along his path he grabbed the sticks that called to him. There were many in this area which was surrounded by concrete yet, enough nature inside to forget the dull grays.  Still along the way he traded these sticks and twigs for other sticks and twigs that he placed earlier in naturally occurring hammocks cradled within the bark of an old tree knot or between two inviting branches.

Each stick and twig that he moved was followed by a message of gratitude and the intent to do no harm.  A pinch pull of hair from his arm was placed here in reverie of balance and reciprocation.

Walking by, I noticed this and waved to him  thinking, "wouldn't life be a little better if we all ran around in a circle and enjoyed the healing power of play. It feels good to let go." Then I thought to myself, "that was totally awkward. I just waved like a guest walking onto the stage for a visit with Oprah".

I was fat non- hippie backwards hat fried from acid tabs and Hendrix Stuttgart posters for hours while rewinding the instrumental track that followed the song "drug store cowboy" on a dubbed Justin Warfield tape over and over again. Those years floated me from the village on my floor to adult ADHD and a far off gaze.

The neighbors hate when I run around my back yard shirtless chanting and banging a drum on rainy evenings.