Is This You? - The Rut

I am a rut follower. I feel comfortable in any one of a hundred ruts I follow. A rut, with its high sides and smooth bottom, will always keep me moving forward. But. Yes, a tattered, rutted “but.” If I only followed ruts, what would happen to my wings that are in place to fly me to places that I can only imagine? Ah, and there is the rub of the rut. The rub on the sides of my rutted life. To remain rutted, or fly. Okay, here’s the story…

Change is for shoes, shirts, and sheets. Change is something we all do on some level, automatically. Then, for some reason, something changes that just doesn’t sit very well. My latest change was quite small; it did, however, rub me the wrong way. When I sit to write these fun “Is This You?” stories, I start by centering the “Is This You?” at the top, go down two spaces, and put the title. Somehow, at some time, an editor requested all the lines be lined up on the left. Left, with those two lines clear over to the left margin. Got it? Clear over to the left! It just felt, well, unnatural. Oh, I did it. After all, I am just the writer; the editor is all-knowing — and has a hand on the money bag to pay me. Going all the way to the left dragged me out of my comfortable “Is This You?” spacing rut. A little thing, I know, I know. But a thing just the same.

Then it dawned on me. I really was in a rut. A centered rut. Coming out of my comfy, well-centered rut had ill effects. Each time I sat to write, I kept going to the left side of the page and starting. Then, time and time again, the whole story just went kafooie.

It would be like if you were, let’s say, baking cookies and put the flour in before the sugar. That would be so wrong. Or you were changing the oil in your truck, and you took the filter off before taking the plug out. Now we all know that would just be wrong — and terribly messy. A rut is a rut is a rut. To be dragged out of it? Nonsense.

There are ruts that last just a short while, and some will last an entire lifetime. We, the rutted and the non-rutted, seem to be quite happy in both circumstances. So why rock the boat? Because we are here to “ROCK ON!”

I challenge you to point out a rut you are in. You have the same two cups of coffee each morning? You drive the same route and park in the same spot at work? You cut your lawn the same way — every time? You make chicken the same way? Fold your undies exactly the same way? Well, welcome to the world of rut-ness.

Personally, I quit writing all the way to the left. I went back to center-ville, and I am quite content with my decision. But there are other ruts this chick-a-dee sloshes around down in. I will not drink a soda unless it has a full cup of ice to begin with. Silly!