Two monks, Tanzan and Ekido, are walking a muddy road in heavy rain, in an old Zen story. Around a bend, a girl in a silk kimono can't cross the intersection, so Tanzan lifts her and carries her over the mud. Ekido says nothing until they reach a lodging temple that night, when he finally complains that a monk shouldn't have gone near her. He put the girl down hours ago, back at the crossing. "Are you still carrying her?" Ekido crossed the mud once and then spent the rest of the day crossing it again in his head. You know the route: the thing you said at dinner, the joke that didn't land, the look you're still reading into. The moment is over and only the replay is still walking. Today, when you notice you're back at that crossing, look down at the road under your feet, which is a different road and a dry one, and walk that one instead.