if i knew i could, i would

Go:

If I knew I could, I would drink that pot of coffee.  The whole durn thing.  I’d hook it up to my arm like a portable IV of energy flowing with dusky oxygen straight to my veins.  I’d be like Benjamin Franklin and subsist on an unearthly four hours of sleep a night.

I would not invent the Franklin stove.  Or bifoculs.  I’d instead tackle sowing 300 lettuce seeds for my garden.

I’d splice myself in two, setting free the cloned, caffeinated beast to hike to a base camp of Mount Everest (I’m not greedy enough to need the summit), to traverse the fields of Patagonia on a wild steed, to travel Route 66 entirely by hitch-hiking.  The cloned, caffeinated beast would earn a PhD in English Literature while also learning to knit tea cozies and baby booties.  The cloned, caffeinated beast would read twelve books a day and still have energy to train for a triathalon.  The cloned, caffeinated beast would not be afraid of failure.  Or heights.  Or spiders.  Even very small ones that may actually be a mere mosquito.

But I can’t finish that whole pot.  I can get a few sips in before I’m whirled off to produce eggs that crisp beautifully at the edges or conjure Elmo’s shade from the recesses of the TV.  With those few sips, I think I’ll have the energy to plant 10 seeds.  One more sip.  Maybe 12.

Stop.

The Gypsy Mama hosts Five Minute Friday each and every week: “On Fridays around these parts we have a little tradition. We throw caution (editing, revising, and worrying) to the winds and just write. Without wondering if it’s just right or not.  For five minutes flat. You’re welcome to play along.”