Tag: poetry

Saga of a Doorknob

Yep, a doorknob.

When I was a child and people asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, my answer was: a doorknob.

That’s right. A doorknob.

It’s no surprise that me saying I wanted to be a doorknob worried my parents

However, it’s important to note that I had given this matter a great thought. It’s true that I wanted to be something that few, if any, people had thought about being. But I also wanted to be something meaningful. I thought that doorknobs provide entry into other rooms, other places, other worlds! And I wanted to be one of those things (a doorknob)  that did that.

So, I decided to see what Copilot (AI) has to say about my childhood predilection, and I was delighted with the answer.

I wrote:

What if a child wants to be a doorknob when they grow up?

Here is the AI response to my question:

That’s delightfully imaginative—and honestly, kind of brilliant. If a child says they want to be a doorknob when they grow up, it’s not about becoming a literal piece of hardware. It’s a window into their creativity, curiosity, or maybe even their sense of humor.

Here’s how you could interpret it:

  • 🌀 Symbolic thinking: Maybe they see the doorknob as something important—something that opens doors, connects spaces, or helps people move forward. That’s poetic!
  • 😂 Playful absurdity: Kids often say things to be silly or get a reaction. It could be their way of exploring language and logic.
  • 🧠 Exploring identity: They might be testing boundaries—what does it mean to “be” something? Can objects have roles like people do?
  • 🎨 Creative expression: This could be the start of a wild story, a drawing, or a game. Maybe they’re imagining a world where doorknobs have personalities and adventures.

Instead of correcting them, it’s a great moment to ask, “What kind of doorknob would you be?” You might get a story about a golden doorknob on a castle, or one that tells jokes every time someone turns it.

Want help turning that idea into a short story or a comic?

Now, I did not respond to the query to move on to a creative tract produced by AI – I’ll leave that to my own creative juices at another time in the future

Meditating with my Horse in Spring

I went to see my old horse yesterday. His name is Buzzy; he’s a retired Standardbred racehorse, and I’ve had him since he was 8.

Yesterday was a lovely April Fools Day with the temperatures in the mid-50s under a sunny sky in a part of the country where 10 inches of snow have been known to fall in May.

Today I joined Buzzy in the small lean-to in his also small corral, picking my way through the mud that is officiating whatever spring we are going to have now, before the May snow, that is. Buzzy is blind, but his ears and nose are faultless and when he heard the crinkle of the carrot bag I brought, he stuck his nose out in his blind way of moving and slowly ambled to me.

There we were, together, standing in spring mud while I doled out the mini-carrots to him one by one. His winter blanket is now off, and I was able to brush off the caked mud on his face, neck and body. He is shedding and I love brushing all the winter-born hair off his body. He likes to be groomed. I like to groom him. It’s a meditative thing – creating pleasure in a simple way for an old being. For this human, it’s soothing – watching the geese pair as they devotedly waddle together,  the wasps who have awakened from their winter nests, and the other horses lollygagging in the first warm sun of the season.

Buzzy is 32, and that is old for a horse – VERY old!

I wonder how many more years, seasons, and days we will have together. Hopefully years, more likely seasons, hopefully, more than days.

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