"On Granny Gear"

Dragging my feet, procrastinating, digging my heels in--any way I phrase it, I have been taking my sweet, sweet time getting off to work.  I know I'm in slow mode when I hear myself pleading, over and over again, "Just get me going, just get me going.  Please."  I talk to God a lot.  As I made a detour to check the raspberries and graze, the thought occurred to me:  I'm in "granny gear."  It made me laugh as that description is so fitting and on more than one level.

For those of you who learned to drive with a stick shift, you know exactly what I am talking about when I use that term.  And is there any other way to learn to drive than with a stick? If you have only driven with an automatic transmission let me explain--"Granny gear" is the lowest of low gears in a vehicle with a manual transmission.  I doubt one can go more than a couple miles per hour when in "granny gear."

When I was 8 years old, my Dad set me up on the tractor and showed me what to do and how to do it.  My task was to steer the giant tractor through the hay field, pulling a trailer, stopping periodically for my brothers and Dad to load the baled hay.  There isn't much to run into in the wide open field, other than bales of hay, so it was the perfect place to learn. Plus, operating in granny gear, the lowest speed on the tractor, meant I was virtually crawling.  I wasn't particularly dangerous or threatening to anyone or anything.

And so I am, all these years later, operating in granny gear once again.  In thinking about it, it feels as though slow motion has been my modus operandi for several months now.  This gardening season has been an unusual one for me.  Getting into a real work rhythm has been elusive.  When I am operating full throttle it is not unusual to be on the job site by 8, returning home 10 hours later.  This year, I find I am puttering around the house, taking my time, and I am fortunate if I make it to a job by 10.  At the other end of the day, there is always a variety of reasons aka excuses to call it a day and return back home. 

When I am able to put circumstances in my life into words, when they can be described, it is as though I have turned a corner.  Situations that have been troubling me are brought into focus, there is clarity.  I have been bothered a great deal by my lackadaisical approach to work and have judged myself as being lazy.  The "granny gear" description is perfect, not only as it applies to my slow rate of speed, but the granny part as well, for I am that, five times over. Pleading the Fifth Amendment to avoid incrimination isn't going to work.  I am guilty.  

There is no explanation for nor understanding of my work habits this season;  I don't have to know why.  What I will do is "just keep going."  And that is a whole other subject for a whole other day.  Besides, even in granny gear a person can end up covering a lot of territory.  It may take a while, but it's better than standing still.  Remember the story of "The Tortoise and the Hare?"  Point made.