Slow and steady

If you could be any animal what would it be?

I used to get that question, like, all the time. When I was nine. And though it makes me slightly queasy, monitoring all that form shifting and, suddenly, in my mind, turning into strange, otherly beings, it was a question exponentially richer than the sort of question a person got at age six: What's your favorite color?

What's your favorite color? is a trick question and cannot be answered correctly. But what animal would you like to be? is full of possibility.

Or, it was.

I am 52. If I were a tiger I would be dead. If I were a dolphin I would be dead. Pelican, owl, moose, goose. Dead, dead, dead, dead. I would probably be dead as an elephant, so let's not risk it. Likewise so as a whale. I might briefly be okay as an alligator or a pearl mussel, but I am not keen on being either. And besides, even those are a bit borderline for, well, not being dead.

Which leaves us with tortoise.

Tortoise it is.

Ah, at least there is a right answer.