What is one to do when one comes across a
rock strewn upon their favorite
path or
trail? To some the
answer is
obvious,
instinctive, even. You gotta
kick it!!
And by this I mean kick it as a
compulsion. As an
automatic action. As a
genetic imperative.
Not everybody kicks rocks, obviously, but a keen observation of the human condition reveals that there exists a definite
subset of the
population whose sight of the rock upon the path immediately instills the desire to kick it therefrom.
Perhaps there is an explanation for this phenomenon in
evolutionary biology. Perhaps the habitual kickers of rocks aided the
tribe by unwittingly marking
paths ever-more clearly over time, or unearthing
treasures, or uncovering
dangers.
And so if you find yourself upon the pebbled path, and feel that welling desire to kick every other stone right out of your way, let the
feeling guide your
foot. For you stand at the end of a long, long
tradition of kicking rocks.
175-ish words, including these ones, for Brevity Quest 2024