This is Digby Pancake. Some days, things go so easy! You wake up, you have goals, you get things done. Ok. That’s not me. That’s Brickle.

But other days, things seem impossible. Girl Person says that every day when she wakes up, she thinks of what she has to do. And more times than not, she tells herself she can’t possibly do it. She’s tells herself that before she even tries. And she finds a million excuses why she can’t do those things. If excuses were valuable, we would be millionaires.

I didn’t understand how she felt until yesterday. We were tired from our travels the day before. But I was pushing myself on our walk. I wasn’t sure where we were walking to. But Girl Person said there was water. And I was happy about that. But I also would have been happy about my bed.

But before we got to the water’s edge, we had to go thru a tunnel. Girl Person called it a covered bridge. The longest covered bridge in this Georgia place, she said.

I would have rather covered my eyes. It was dark in there. Long. Never ending. Plus, you could see thru the floor in parts. I took one step inside. Brickle took a step. And we looked at each other. We didn’t really want to do it. But we decided that the promise of a cool swim would be worth it.

It was a long walk. A very long walk. I didn’t want it to be that long, but it was. It took all my willpower to not turn around.

It helped that Brickle was there with me. But when we both saw a car that was about to come in the bridge with us, I froze. It seemed like my decision was a hasty one.

But as Girl Person told us that the car was going to wait for us, I trusted her. The car stopped. I picked up my pace. I felt good that everyone was being patient and kind. And the long walk ended up feeling a lot shorter. And the water felt extra good. Extra good!

We may have a long walk of sorts some days. And maybe it’s someone else who is needing encouragement on their long walk. Can we be patient and help each other? Sometimes, that’s the only way to get to our destination.

Every place we visit teaches us something about ourselves. Every place teaches us about a weakness we may have, or even a strength that we didn’t know we had.

So take that long walk. And if you need to hold my paw, I’m here.

–Digby Pancake