An elderly couple live a few blocks away from my house. They might pass for any other couple, save, perhaps, for their early morning schedule. Every day at sunrise, they hit the road in their colourful track suits, with determined strides. As I pull the curtains aside, I often spot them hastening back to their home after an exhausting walk. Exhausting it must be for the people in their late 60s or thereabouts. But ever a lazybone, by this time I would barely have batted my eyelids.

They made me think — their energy and determination. But look at me. It’s not that I wake up empty-minded. Instead, as soon as I wake up, a flood of ideas start swirling inside my head. The problem is that they go as soon as they come, as I don’t have the energy to hit the iron when it is hot. I keep staring at the ceiling only to close my eyes and rustle inside my blanket. Given my sloth, it wouldn’t be a surprise if I kicked the bucket even before I turned 50. But it is in the womb of time. Only God knows.

Sometimes I wonder what is it that makes some people lethargic and other energetic. I wonder how many people there might be in my neigbourhood, or even in the entire country, who take time for granted and pass it as lazily as I do, or even with the added habit of letting ideas roam in their minds fleetingly. Notwithstanding all the time I waste, I never seem to have enough time to study, visit friends, explore new places, read novels, among zillion other things.

So, did I inherit this bound-to-bed trait from my parents? Or did I acquire it over time? The former is a non-starter as no one works as hard as my parents. If the latter is the case, I don’t know when I picked it up, because my parents tell me that when I was a boy, I was anything but tardy? Is it my friends, my environment, my temperament? I cannot decide. The only thing I know for sure is that I want to kick the habit. But how does one go about it when one’s all life has been been spent slouching and slumbering? I’m in a desperate need for an antidote. But I find the discovery as elusive as ever. Till I can say Eureka! I think I’ll have only to cat nap and complain. At present, I’m at a loss. What to do and not to do is a problem for me.