On The Road

Humans love to make plans. We set our sights, choose a major, set goals, select a career path. Not a bad thing, entirely. And is is probably part of our wiring. But today 7 year olds start worrying about how their transcript is going to look on their college applications and have the schedules that would rival a candidate for public office. They worry about how to participate in enough extra-curricular activities to outshine all their peers. So I got to thinking that we may be taking this planning thing way to seriously.

I've been one of those serious plan makers - and I tell you that I am not sure where on the spectrum I fall now - but I am starting to think that maybe I should chuck the plan making and start with the living. Seven year olds do not know that what happens in high school will be of little consequence a decade later. But I would hope that the "grown-ups" around them do. Why, then, do they continue to hold up the facade is beyond me. Maybe it is like the story of the Prince's new clothes, nobody has the guts to step forward, point their finger and shout "Your're a fool!". Plan making can keep us from living. Because real living is more fluid. Planning is a mental process - living is physical, experiential. We can get way to caught up in planning. Many people leave this physical life with stellar plans but little else - because the circumstances were never perfect for launching "the plan".

So where does Hope fit in with all this? I think it is what we have left if we are lucky enough to realize the folly of our planning ways. You may say "All you have is Hope?" Well, no, but I think it is the wagon I am going to hitch my star to because all that other stuff, that planning and choosing and selecting, it is really all an illusion. An illusion of control. A lie that was started by someone before either you or I ever got here and it is perpetuated by.....God knows what. So, at this point, I am embracing Hope. I am reveling in Hope. And I am fluid, following the dance, like a tree in the wind, to let Hope carry me along while I practice my Faith.