Little Piggies

She started by counting her toes hoping that toes, more than fingers, would ground her - unless she chose to walk on her hands, which was not entirely out of the question for these were peculiar times calling for peculiar modes of transporting oneself, especially to and from work, which had been more stressful than usual this last week – so much so that she had found herself counting her toes for grounding.

She reached ten and thought that normal enough in one’s toes, but she had to be sure, so she counted again, though not before consulting an encyclopedia – several encyclopedias, in fact, for, much to her chagrin, she did not find toes in the “t” volume or piggies under “p,” but finally found the proper number of toes under “a” for anatomy.

Again she counted ten and, though she had hoped this would ground her – in many ways besides the standing on of said toes: give her bearings in life, reaffirm her ability to compute and comprehend complex numbers, prove once and for all that birth defects sometimes happen thirty years after the fact – but it did not, in fact, ground her at all for still she was flighty and dodgy and terrible at math and rife, though still rife with birth defects newly formed some thirty years after the fact (or twenty-eight to those who knew no better).

Then it was that she began to dig and, having no yard, this meant digging straight into the floor, which brought forth choices – she had found choices more and more daunting and tonight was the night to approach the ever boding level of facile when it came to choices, especially those that would ground her – choices of where to begin this digging adventure: bathroom or living room, hardwood or linoleum, shovel or spoon, choices.

Of the three major choices, she opted for the latter, the former, and, lacking a shovel and money to buy said shovel and the propensity to visit such places that carried said shovels, the latter, and within minutes was digging down into faux wood in the desperate hope that somewhere beneath her feet, this floor, the foundation, the sewer lines, and the direct route to China, she would find the true secret to grounding herself.

If nothing else, she would get a good workout from this, tone her triceps, build up hunger, thus alleviating the guilt of eating, which had plagued her for some time now, whether exercising or not, though she found that one thinks very little of eating while digging – a bit of a surprise considering the presence of the spoon, her favorite utensil for eating.

She dug and dig and digged and digged and could not decide which fit properly into good grammar, but hoped that once she had grounded herself (or perhaps grund herself) she would epitomize proper speech, good sleeping habits, excellent nutrition, and delightful conversation at parties – this last hope formed despite her previous twenty-two party conversations ending with dropped food, stained blouses, profuse apologies, and quotations from great pop hits of the 1970s.

There on the newly damaged floor, spoon in hand, ten toes across two feet, she fell asleep and dreamed of digging in all forms: machines, dogs, grave-makers, groove-shakers, giant spoons, and even the occasional shovel, though even in dreaming these confused her for they appeared quite out of context – in the question “where exactly do shovels come from?” both of her consciouses, waking and sub, allied.

She awoke feeling thirsty, hungry, too, confused a bit, though less than any of these, grounded. The digging had done nothing but reduce her security deposit. She had not reached China, she still had ten toes, and life felt flighty, especially life lived in her body. She washed the spoon, put it back into the drawer, and sat in her bed. She began counting her toes again, thinking maybe one had run off in the night and digged its way to China.