THE BIG CREAM PIE OF COMPLACENCY

Early this morning I was tooling smoothly on my motorcycle along the lakeside road through the Spring sunshine, not a care in the world, my mission being to close the final chapter on a dental assignment known subjectively as The Molar Crown Affair. Everything was mission-perfect, as it so seldom is. What with the blue sky, the morning sun, the crisp air, the nearly completed dental work, I felt more complacent than I'd felt in weeks. I probably had the same look on my face that Donald Duck had in that old cartoon just before his house broke in half.

So in retrospect it was definitely time for something to happen, like for the motorcycle to begin feeling funny, as though the road was turning into large regular lumps of tapioca. I shimmied to a stop and saw that the rear tire was flat as a puddle. Road too narrow, no way I could leave the bike there, so I rode it the rest of the way, sort of like riding a fat elephant on Prozac, through the small villages and past the roadside bystanders that always line the way of post-complacency events. Thus it was that I became a memorable form of entertainment for what otherwise would have been just another same-old morning for the lakeside folks.

But this little rumination turns out not to be about a flat tire, but about complacency, the state prodromal to the big cream pie of events. One minute you're anywhere on cloud 5 through 9 and then it's up your nose, coming out your ears and sliding down your face, you're wiping it out of your eyes, yet you never take complacency as a warning, because it's as comfy as a warm fire and a glass of wine with friends; that's why you don't suddenly look over your shoulder or get more insurance or start flashing your SOS or at least run for your life, because what could be better than this? And before you know it you've got that flat tire or your house is broken in half or you've elected an incompetent to national office. The sky's the limit, really.

But a flat tire is nothing in the big garage of happenstance. So in my minor post-complacency reality I slithered and bounced and shuddered my way along all over the narrow road, having to pull to the side if a car came, since I really couldn't do much directional fine-tuning. It was interesting in its way, as was the visit to the dentist and the long walk home, wearing my new crown. Like I often say when I'm complacent, there is good in all things. By the time I got out of the dentist's chair I'd gotten rid of the complacency, which was good, because when I got home my house was still intact.