As the nails of the chilly, almost-spring air tore at my skin, clawing at my coat, my feet pulled me outside the haven of warmth inside the school where they met the sidewalk with a squelch. The leftovers of a white winter. The half-melted, sopping precipitation flicked up at my ankles as I continue to trudge on through the murk.

Two weeks ago, this docile gray slush was imperceptible ice waiting to claim its next unsuspecting victim. In fact, I was one of the hopelessly clueless victims. Three steps outside the school, I found myself staring up at the vast expanse of blue sky punctuated only by scattered tufts of cloud. Giggling at my own humiliating misfortune, I labored arduously to stand on the sheet of ice; I know I looked as strained as a baby fawn the first time it endeavors to get its legs underneath it.

In two weeks, the exasperating and purposeless sludge will cease to exist. I can step outside the school bolstered by confidence and sure-footed. The air will no longer whip around me, and sidewalks will dry. Who knows? It might even be sixty degrees, which is warm in comparison to the tempestuous winter we’ve endured.

The point that I mean to make is that a great deal of change has occurred in a matter of weeks. Two weeks ago, I was tumbling through life, free falling. In two weeks, I could be flouncing through life. Yet currently, I am stuck in slush.

Slush is a mushy transition stage. It is not quite snow, yet it is not completely melted. It isn’t quite anything, but it is annoying nonetheless. Slush is simply there, in all of its aqueous insignificance. That’s how I feel. I am sinking into a slump, a slush slump.

The ennui of school began the thawing process. Despite having “snow week” under a month ago and having Spring Break in under a month, everything at school feels horribly repetitive. Wake up. Go to class. Take a test. Receive and complete homework. Go to bed. Repeat four more times.

I’m craving change.

I’m craving a deviation from the path. I’m craving the raging thunderstorm that shares the sky with the bright, cheery sun. I’m craving the unusual glimpse of the stark moon at noon.

I need something new.

This slush has only been here a week, but its time is long gone. This time of year should be filled with serene rains and delicate new growth, both physically and metaphorically. Where are the lulling cascades of spring rains? Why must I have so much to do that it feels as though I carry ten-pound weights in my backpack?

The sooner the slush slides away, the sooner spring is here. And with spring comes spring clean, an essential cliche ritual. I desperately need to cleanse my mind of negativity just as much as my room of clutter. Freedom makes for productivity. Or is it the other way around?

I have talked myself in circles, words creating double meanings and meaningless phrases. My mind has become mush, too slushy to form into a snowman of coherent thoughts. Still, bits and pieces relentlessly hang around in the corners of my mind, too useless to be interesting.

Currently, I am stuck in slush.