Plans

For Liz.

Advice kids: Never make plans. Plans are for idiots. Incidentally, I wrote a thing about idiots on Monday which I was saving to put up here today. See, in my head, I'm amazing and have several thousand followers interested in whatever the hell it is I do. Case in point: this. So I decided a while ago that I'd update this blog every Wednesday, on the Wednesday, in order to keep my habits as a writer somewhat constant. After a while, I figured I was running out of things to write about, which is lazy speak for "I was becoming more and more lazy". Over time, I allowed myself "off-weeks" where I'd skip a Wednesday whenever I saw fit. In 2013, this suddenly became every fucking Wednesday.

I've been kidding myself that, with the final term of the final year of my degree looming, I needed to spend my time focussing on important work. Side projects like this would, therefore have to take a hit. Incidentally, that's the same logic I applied to putting off a serious conversation some weeks back. See, in reality, I'm an idiot. The very kind of idiot I complained about in a rambly thing I typed up two days ago. The kind of idiot who makes plans for the future because they don't realise that present is all that actually matters. All of a sudden, now, I realise I'm contradicting myself. I'm arguing with me. And I hate that. Why can't I just get along?

So, what's all this then? This is my last-minute replacement post, hastily cobbled together with cold fingers, perpetually perspiring underarms and the realisation that I am an idiot. In the two day period since writing my now-hypocritical analysis of other people, a close friend received a spot of bad news. Actually, scratch that. The worst news. The fact that this post contains a dedication at the top means I don't really have to go into detail. Unless you're an idiot.

I read through my idiocy post this morning, ready and raring because I finally had a weekly update for this blog. The only problem was that I actually read it. I don't normally read these things back until after they're in the virtual ether. But I read the pre-planned one and oh, my God, it's absolutely awful. To be frank, I was in a bit of a dark place when I hammered it out; I was in one of those I'm-angry-at-the-world-and-it's-the-world's-fault kind of moods where basically everyone on the face of the Earth, bar me, would have to fall into a pit of despair laced with parasites to satisfy me. But situations change and I feel it would've been wholly inappropriate to spew such vitriol onto the world knowing what I know now.

Some months ago, I fell into that old tangled web of personal feelings. With only my own meandering existence to draw from, that old situation never ends well for anyone. But still, the heart wants what it wants and the brain tries to rationalise it by being an idiot; by keeping quiet at whatever rare opportunity arises to speak up. Technically, I suppose that's the mouth's fault. Or the throat. Either way, I'd planned ahead to get kicked repeatedly in the chest. The actual assault occurred far sooner than I'd anticipated, thus leaving me feeling a) an idiot for planning ahead, and b) kicked in the chest.

So yeah, fuck plans. Plans only exist to remind people that fixed future events exist. Except they don't. Everything's hypothetical. The only thing that matters at any given moment is that very given moment. At the risk of sounding philosophical or awe inspiring, the past is what's fixed, the future is hypothetical. It's what you do with the moments you live in that you can possibly have any control over. Okay? This is not a chastising lecture to either the living or the deceased. This is pure fucking common sense. Most don't realise this, and I know that because I didn't fucking realise it until pretty much just now, when I wrote this paragraph.

Use the time you get properly to get what you want done. Don't assume you get more. For the love of whoever's up there/out there/somewhere, never make plans. Here endeth the lesson, idiot.