There was a man who thought a lot, too much and not enough.

He woke up feeling hungry, went into the kitchen to forage for food.

He was spoiled. He was served breakfast so often he expected it.

He thought oatmeal. There it was in the canister, but none cooked.

He thought, “Why is it always cooked? It doesn’t initially come that way. Do the flakes of oats not contain their essence? Might it not be argued that the cooking doth diminish that essence, that the vitality of its essence is reduced therefore by the action of the flame upon water? That the dry flat flakes by subduing immersion are rendered more chewable certainly, but deprive the otherwise consumer of the dry initial produce both the exercise of jaw, certainly a necessary daily activity, and the freshness of Eden the mother of all things growing, like plants?”

“I shall give it a try,” he intoned to himself, lifted the lid and reached in.

“No need to sully a bowl,” he thought/said with practicality, grabbed a handful, stuffed his mouth and began to chew.

It was not a pleasant experience. He had not thought that far ahead. The grinding dryness caused his mouth to salivate defensively and it began to drip off his chin.

He persisted, as he knew by experience, that continued chewing will eventually subdue chunks and larger shapes, reducing them to swallowability, and gradually this began to happen, the smaller now soggy mush more and more disappearing down his throat, his gullet as it were, to his waiting but no longer eager cavernous pouch of stomach.

The masticated flakes slid down away, disappeared from his mouth. And then there were none.

His mouth felt both relief and regret. The man swallowed water after sloshing to remove the last traces, like a stirrup cup to and for the stomach before it begin its journey to digestion, rather like the cement mixer we see from time to time, the great barrel turning rotationally to mix the elements of dry and liquid probably water so the homogenized issue can be channeled and poured out into a mold, but here I stop the image because of where it would lead me in human organic terms distastefully, verifying the old cliche, “What goes in must come out,” leading to an image which would I fear upset my own digestion to expulsion.

Now here is the interesting part, the upshot as it were. The man with chewed initially dry flakes clutched his abused stomach which began to clench in protest at being thus unexpectedly and unacceptably assaulted, fell to the floor, and writhed.

Some hours later, he came to his senses, and thought some more. “Hmm…” he thought. Then, additionally, “Hmm…Perhaps maybe probably almost certainly I should have thought a little more about the whole enterprise, forethought, consequences, as one should “Look before you leap” or “Don’t count your chickens” or any of the other helpful platitudes which enable us to live our lives more slipperily from day to day.”

He thought, “That’s just a thought.”

I know what you must think, you there, listening to this tale of instructive woe. “Is this for real? Did it really happen? Was there ever such a man?”

I continue my story by projecting my imagined sequel. The man pulled himself off the floor, staggered to a mirror to see if he was still alive, and, confirming the fact, thought, “Hmm…That was a close one! I should perhaps consider alternatives, I should wait for cooked oatmeal that even I myself could so prepare, could place the flakes into water until they boil to subservience. I can still do many things, I must not give in to my congenital laziness which has plagued me for lo these many years and prevented me from achieving more than otherwise.”

So I dragged my own haggard self to the mirror to see if my telling of this fanciful surmise should so have enervated me that I could visibly verify the signs of effect.

It did. The signs were there, I fear for all to see. I asked the mirror, this part is true, “Am I that man who thinks too much and not enough?”

The mirror nodded disturbingly.

I felt myself empty, drained by realization. I staggered to my chair where I sit inordinately, subdued my now intrusive hunger, and tried to sleep.