Everyone should walk.

Last Saturday I was in dire need of a trip to the store.Thankfully, there's a Meijer about a mile from where I live. Granted, it's a Meijer that smells weird and has a couple of creepy people standing at the door to say "Welcome," but it's a Meijer nonetheless. My parents were out of town for the day, and being my lazy self, I have yet to obtain a job, and thus permission to obtain my drivers license. Sad. I settled on the only available option: walking.

I sent John off to play in the snow drift a couple houses down in the cul de sac with a folded up post-it note containing the top secret information that is my cell phone number and the garage door opening code in his pocket. I told him to use the back door if he wanted to go back inside, and left him with a final shout over my shoulder that I would be back in an hour or so because I didn't know how fast I would walk.

With the recent snow cover, there's absolutely no possibility of me walking on the sidewalk, even though I put some heavy duty, yet fashionable, snow boots over my spiffy Adidas windpants. The drifts would be no match for my mittens and stupid hat, a gem from my stupid hat collection, but I decided against it anyway. It would take a long time, and I didn't need to give the people driving by another reason to laugh at me. The first being my outrageously large, red sunglasses.

I was on a mission to obtain classified personal items: hair conditioner and contact solution -- but remember, that's top secret. I was rounding the corner, mentally prepared to completely zone out to some David Bowie, when my headphone cord froze. Awesome. This unforeseen lack of tunes allowed me to hear some running footsteps behind me, though. It was John. He walked with me past a couple of houses telling me about the army of robots that were laying siege on our house. He would have to walk along the little drainage river bank to get to the Russian HQ and ask them for more weapons, and he asked, "Is that okay?" Of course it was okay. I don't want any robots in my house.

Then I was alone. Usually, when I'm alone, I talk to myself. It's kind of dorky and weird sometimes if someone's listening outside my bedroom door, but I do it anyway. Being with other people can, and will, most of the time, annoy me to no end, and being alone freaks me out. So, talking to myself is a happy medium. It's very comforting. Unfortunately, after it snows, when the sun comes out, people emerge from their houses and start to shovel their driveways. In order to prevent myself from looking even more silly, I forbade myself from talking to myself. It's very sad when you have to resort to that...

Instead I thought about all the things I would do when I got home. I felt much more empowered to do the things that I had been dreading on the frozen tundra that is Stone Creek Boulevard than I had in my nice warm house. I would call so-and-so, I would give them a piece of my mind. I'd finally email whatsherface, I'd finally complete that one application. I thought about and drafted all the passive aggressive speeches I wanted to give, to people who were bugging me. I thought about what narration would be happening if my life was a movie. I thought about horses a little, how pretty the clouds are, and really what a great and amazing world it is that we live in.

When you get home after a walk, most of that disappears. You know you're never going to call so-and-so, or email whatsherface, or deliver those brilliant speeches, or make your life a movie. You even sort of forget how great the world is. You're just happy to be warm at home (whose armies have successfully pushed back the robot invasion), and excited to finally get to use your new Tresemme Naturals conditioner.