Author: Patricia Kambitsch

Slow Learner’s Creed

I have no faculty; I make the Heaven and the Earth my teachers.

I have no school; I make the universe my university.

I have no power in the accumulation of knowledge; I make curiosity my power.

I have no matriculation fees; I make magnanimity my tuition.

I have no intellectual property; I make open exchange my own.

I have no authority; I make inquiry my author.

I have no letters to follow my name; I make learning my degree.

I have no tardy bell; I can learn as early and learn as late as I require.

I have no field of specialization; precise action is my specialty.

I have no discipline; adaptability is my backbone.

I have no answers; I ask bigger questions.

I have no intelligence; community is my intellect.

I have no expertise; the will to learn is my mastery.

I have no scope and sequence; all the world is open to me at any time.

I have no highlighter markers; when all is highlighted, nothing is.

I have no future; learning for now is my future.

I have no syllabi; I determinate my learning goals.

I have no canon; I author my own text.

I have no grade point average; immediate results measure my efforts.

I have no homework; learning is my play.

I have no rigor; flexibility is my strength.

I have no preparation for the future; all that exists is now.

Slow Learning

There are times when I think I am invincible, but that doesn’t last very long. Just a second or two at a time. Really much less than that. Just an instant. A nanosecond, maybe. The zero time that nothing that lies after the past and before the future.

The now. Just that eency weency speck of time. So tiny, can I even know that it is there? Where is it? Is it now? Now? A blink? Less than a blink? The unrealized, unintelligible, unknowable, unnamable now.

Now is when I am invincible.

That kind of now.

The now that I cannot feel or measure or even know for sure that it exists. The kind of now that one could arguably argue that it doesn’t exist at all.

And still, there it is. Now. Say it fast now. Draw it out with a breath. N o w

And there are times when the energy flows, but now, here I am, pushing and shoving and nothing ever gets anywhere and I don’t know why. The reason why the only reason on earth why anything ever occurs is when we think too much about the past and the future and not about the invincible now

Now

Tiny little zero newborn now

Fresh and innocent

No judgment

Just now

No present ticking away.

No past gathering moss and mildew and tentacles.

No responsibility except for just this little tiny nowness now. The instant between tick and tock without the and of course.

MMMMMMM that time between sensation and perception

Between the flick of tongue between lips

Between the teeth

The twitch you knew was coming, and coming.

Did you know you were coming now?

Are you here now?

Reading this are you reading this now?

Are you bored now?

Want me to write more about sex now, like I did in the past, just a few lines ago.

God, I miss the way things used to be and I so long for a future when things will be different.

Doesn’t everybody?

Time to get back to now.

Now.

Now I’ve been writing about now for the last eight minutes, give a few glimpses of nowness here and there. And nowness gets a squiggly red line under it, when it’s the word squiggly that deserves it.

Now I miss you.

But it’s not about now, really, it’s all about the past and how I want the past to be just like the future, so in the mean time. I’m just waiting on a now that will never get here because I’ve got a now that I might as well get used to.

Now.