the myth of planning

“[I'm] happy enough. I don't expect much. I don't get much, I don't give much. I generally enjoy whatever comes along. That's my answer for you, summed up for your feminine consideration. I'm happy enough.”

-Cal, Waitress, 2007

You plan. Oh, you plan. You plan because that is how things are done, you were told. You plan to one day be at the top of your game. To work your way up that corporate ladder, to madly scramble over the aching heads and shoulders of your colleagues, to one day reach that top rung. From there, you'll take in the panorama with tired eyes and throbbing arms. An unblemished scene stretching before you, if nothing can be unblemished, you'll feel some kind of pride, some kind of accomplishment. An achievement to tide you over for those few years between goal and death.

You plan to one day find a nice girl and settle down. She'll be smart and funny, capable of making you laugh when you're down, and keeping you interested when you want to stray. She'll be perfect, you think, with her own life so she stays out of yours. With a solid career, and a passion for all things culinary. And she'll exist in a small space beyond beauty. There isn't a word for it yet, because nothing, so far, has existed to which such a word might apply. But you'll use it when you find her. Only then, will the dictionary be altered.

You plan; do you see it yet? You plan your route to work in the morning, choosing one snarl of traffic over another, thinking all the while, “If I had only gone the other way....” But this inconvenience allows you time to plan which complicated caffeinated beverage you will choose when you get to your destination. You decide on a non-fat, double latte and while sipping at the concoction begin to wish you had gone with the double short, non-fat, low foam latte.

You plan out your work day, but discard that manifesto at the first unexpected turn. Then, you plan to throw the week away to whimsy only to get drawn back into your original plan of structure when things begin to go smoothly. Plan, plan, plan. Wrench, wrench, wrench. The weekend is planned, but falls apart in a flood of cancellation calls and poor weather. Suppers are planned, but these plans, too, are rerouted by restaurant closures and out-of-stock markets.

Sigh.

You plan to be happy, but it seems that something out there is taking preventative measures against said plan. Yes, something is obviously working against you at this point. How else can the cancellation of your flight be explained? The breakage of your car? The death of your cat? These annoyances have got to be part of the well-executed plan of some other, benevolent, being.

***

Lying in bed one night, you suddenly hit on a new plan. You plan to toss out this passion for plans, to take things as they come, to never expect, because it is this absurd expectation of success which inevitably ends up drowning you in a sea of failure in the end. Yes, there is a new plan in place. A great plan. An infallible plan. You plan to just be... happy enough. And that should be all right.

jangle

The barista tells me about how she doesn't believe in love, but I'm not listening. Instead, the metallic clank, clank, clanking of a spoon making the rounds of a cheap café coffee cup fills my ears and pilfers my thoughts. My caffeine-charged leg bounces to a relentless, phantom bass line. My nerves jangle.

Fingers tap furiously at the keys of my laptop, and the barista edges in a little closer across the table, still talk, talk, talking. Something about love. The end of love. Her obsession with it. Fingers tap, and eyes vibrate, taking in the string of words before me. These are my thoughts. Not love, but something else. An obsession, surely, but one different from that of the barista's. Not deeper, not shallower, just altogether—

“What?” I ask.

The barista stops dead in mid sentence, her eyes wide, pupils dilated, huge, like two cups of strong, black coffee.

“Pardon me?” she asks in return, a lock of chocolate hair slipping carelessly from behind a petite ear.

“You were saying something,” I reply. “I'm sorry, but I wasn't quite listening.”

Her candy cane lips effortlessly form a smile, and she tells me that's okay. “I know you're usually quite a good listener,” she says, obviously oblivious. “You must be working on something awfully important....”

Now it's my turn to smile, but I can't quite keep the pity out of it, I'm sure. Eyes flit to cup, and I notice I'm nearing the bottom. Hand trembling, vibrating, really, I clutch desperately at the cup, raising it to my lips and drain the last of the acrid black liquid. I slide the cup across the table toward the barista.

“Would you be a dear, and grab me another?”

“Of course!” she bleats, snatching it up and turning on her heel.

“Oh, and one more thing,” I say, meeting her dark eyes as she turns back to me. “Make it something really complicated. Have fun. Be adventurous.”

Take your bloody time, I think, and resume the tap, tap, tapping of keys. My leg continues its bounce. My nerves jangle still. I know it won't be long before she's back – and I wouldn't have it any other way.

pivot

I really feel like I'm gonna give the slip to time,
and everyone I meet is a damn good friend of mine.
But will I ever stop to think just how wrong I was?

We start to feel like there's nothing left for us to know,
there's nothing left for us to see, there's nowhere else for us to go.
But will we ever stop think just how wrong we were?

I show up in town in the pouring rain, exiting the taxicab in a rush before the driver really realizes how much I've shortchanged him. Words are exchanged. Opinions are expressed. There's some yelling. I pull the collar of my old loden coat up over my neck to block out the harsh wind, and make a vain attempt to shield my head from the pouring rain with a folded newspaper. The ink runs, staining my fingers an angry black.

Though it might look like it, I'm not homeless.

Clumsily trotting half a block down the wet street, I hastily duck down a crumbling loggia before coming to rest in the chill, still air of a great stone archway. Tired, I throw my soaked back up against the wall. I try the mammoth door beside me; it's locked but has a little give.

This is the beginning. Where it all starts. This really is the new new. Each life has one; an instant where everything changes. One man encounters it when he decides to take flying lessons. Another woman finds it when she decides to wash a few bottles of pills down with a pint of Jäger. Things change. Things are irrevocably different. There is no going back.

I throw a little weight at the door with a heavy shoulder. There's a cracking, but the door maintains its integrity. I give it a little more, harder this time, and the frame splinters. Once more, and I'm in, pleased to find the air dry and the furnace on.

Though it might seem like, I'm not a vandal.

The debris in the stairwell tells me that no-one's been here for a long time. At least not for a couple months. My feet find their way, the soles of my shoes nestling softly into the layers of dust on the stairs. At the top, I find a sea of abandoned grey cubicles, ringed by the yawning mouths of a couple dozen vacant offices. How much suffering was incurred in this very place? How much displeasure?

Pausing for a moment, my nose twitches, shocked by the sterility of it all. My ears...my ears catch something just a little ways off. The soft hum of an electric motor coming to life. The ka-chunk of a feeder. The whir of paper. A printer has started up, or a fax machine, somewhere nearby.

Though I act like it, I'm not a detective.

Cautiously, I duck my head into a few empty work areas before I find the source of the sounds. A blue LED flashes, showing me the way. My heart pounds. I try to swallow, but find my mouth parched. Shaking, I clutch at the lone piece of paper expelled from the haunted machine. I switch a lamp on beside me, not at all surprised when the light comes on.

CONFIDENTIAL

Operation BGM has been aborted. Potential agent, 98235, has been removed. Carry on.

ML

Somewhere in the room, there are footsteps with no body attached. The paper slips from my grasp, fluttering to the floor at my feet. I bolt. Across the floor, and down the stairs, wildly vaulting the debris field at the bottom.

This is my beginning, this is how I leave behind the old me, ushering in a one: legs running like mad through a darkened loggia. Lungs filled with crisp wet air. Mind filled with fear.

choked in layers

I would save you if I could. And, if things go my way, I just might. I could save you from light and noise pollution. I could save you from advertising overdose and urban sprawl. Overpopulation and mutated viruses. Propaganda and counterpropaganda. Terrorism and counterterrorism. Wars, global warming, and off-gassing. Big business, government monitoring, and social disconnection. Most importantly, I could save you from banality. I could save you from yourself.

Someday, you might thank me. Parades in my honour, streets and civic holidays named after me. Everyone will remember the day when I saved humanity. Everyone will remember the day when Becker Garvey Moore saved humanity from slipping into the whitewashed folds of a lacklustre hell. That, or I’ll wind up dead or destitute, lucky to have you toss me some change for a pint. Fortunate to have you walk by me with eyes filled with something other than disdain. Who knows what the future might bring.

I could have been comfortable in my big house. I should have been. My big rambling house on its rambling street. My big rambling house on its rambling street in that great, insipid sea, suburbia. That sea of bleached vinyl and colourless shingles. Empty, staring windows and vacant decks. Manicured gardens and faultless hedges. That roof of lazy blue skies, and that eternal green carpet of broad-leafed, weed-free grass. I could have been comfortable – but just how is an imperfect man supposed to feel at home amongst such perfection?

Each day was the same. Wake up at the same time. Drink the same two cups of black coffee. Eat the same toast and eggs. Read the same bloody news. War over here. Terrorism over there. A little murder. Some rape. A lot of thieving. I’d unplug my car, make the same trip to work, do the same meaningless bullshit. I’d sit vacantly at my desk, or, if I needed a change, angrily. Sometimes, on a good day, I’d just sit there complacently. Watch the clock. Drive home. Warm up the same supper. Watch the same television. Sleep the same sodding sleep.

Excuse me if I seem a little disillusioned, a little disappointed, a little disparaging. But we were promised more, were we not? Should not life be at least somewhat interesting? Flitting trip back to childhood, and dreams of adventure and exploration. Of world travel and voyages into space and beyond. We were allowed to foster certain expectations, then, while our elders kept the sinister truth to themselves: that our adult selves would never amount to what we expected; that our lives would not be different, unique; that we would never have any fun.

2031, and I was far, far away from what a naïve me just twenty years ago thought I might one day become. I had grown into little more than a sucker at a desk, my work monitored by management, my life monitored by the govvies. I was an empty shell, a husk, my insides scooped out years ago by the authorities and replaced with sterile foam filling. Creativity suppressed, any individuality deterred. Bubble-wrapped for my own protection.

Then, it never occurred to me that I might one day be in a position to construct change, to posit permutation. Then, it never occurred to me that I might one day elevate myself to an architect of my own advancement. Our advancement. That I might one day wake up, rub these tired eyes, and see everything, for the very first time, as it really was: a nightmare within a nightmare within a nightmare. Ad nauseum.

small matter of questions

Where are you now? Sitting on another ashen shore, just outside of time, a little beyond space. A rocky coastline stretches out for miles beneath a vacant white sky, and that infinite ocean rolls in and out, its brackish waters coldly existing without a second thought for its guest. It doesn’t care about you, with your petty wants and concerns, your mundane needs and inquiries. No. That ocean flatly ignores you and continues doing what oceans do: coming and going.

“We could have been,” you say, your voice barely audible above the crashing waves. “I could have been - but I didn’t try quite hard enough.”

Little hands digging into soft sand. Petite feet pushing out and away.

“I wound up in exactly the place I deserve,” you say. “The end of my life was the sum of my decisions. I could have done more.”

You’re a memory, resting inside my head, forever wandering those desolate beaches. This is your afterlife. Sitting on a rotting pier we never knew in life, existing in a harbour forever hidden away just around the bend in the furthest recesses of my mind. What do you think about while wandering through the wilds of my thoughts? What do you dream about while sleeping in my dreams?

“Inconsequential. Average. Pursuer of the status quo.” You sigh because it’s all you’ve left to say. “Doomed.”

Sad that your once glowing skin has grown to match the colour of nothing, and your hair has become as washed out as that colourless sun. And how your eyes, those same eyes which were once so bewitching in life, have now become so dull, so empty, so prosaic.

“I could’ve done more,” you whisper. “Jesus, I could’ve done more. All I needed to do was to ask myself what it was that I needed to do next. Just once.”

So, where are you now? Sitting on another ashen shore, just outside of time, a little beyond space. Questioning. At the end of a life unfulfilled. At the end of a life unlived.

a comfortable place

You wonder, a little, if it is so wrong that you don’t really care about Africa. Today, an entire village is burned to the ground, but your thriving metropolis remains intact. A warlord orders the extermination of more than two hundred souls, but you’ve still got your decaf mocha latte. A child, a soldier, ten years old, hoists an aging Kalashnikov in celebration, and it is all you can do to hoist that television remote one more time. There has to be something better on. Something a little – lighter.

click

You wonder, a little, if it is so wrong that you don’t really care about politics. Today, a raging debate about the nature of debates. Behind the scenes, people are busy deciding which candidates are more important for you to see more of, and you just think, Has he always had that same hairdo? She’s really aging poorly, isn’t she? Look at those neck wrinkles. Behind the scenes, your next president is being chosen, and your finger just can’t wait to press the button. There has to be something better on. Something a little more – interesting.

click

You wonder, a little, if it is so wrong that you don’t really care about religion. The dirty fingers of war ceaselessly poke and jab at this earth, while your fingers are finding sticky salvation at the bottom of a family-sized bag of zero trans fats crisps. Don’t bother to ask yourself why one country goes to war with another. Tell yourself that it’s for the better good of mankind. Tell yourself that it’s because of human rights. Heck, go ahead and tell yourself that it’s because of oil. Just don’t dig any deeper. Go ahead and push that button. Just push it.

click

You wonder, a little, if it is so wrong that you don’t really care about reality. And we’re talking real reality here – you have no trouble getting on board with the reality television variety of reality. That reality where one man is challenged to find love or lust amongst a flock of sprayed and spackled beauties. That reality where a dozen losers are cast away on a fake island. That reality where a dozen young hopefuls sing their hearts out for a once in a lifetime deal with the devil. No, you have no trouble accepting those realities.

You can relax now, your heart and mind at ease.

You can relax now, your finger no longer itching.

You can relax now, your soul having found its place.

hail to the chief

Skin pinches, needle sticks in. No noise comes from my mouth. No. Not this mouth. Teeth grind a little, molars crunching roughly on molars. Muscles in the jaw tighten, sinewy chords in neck bulge, and fists clench straining against canvas restraints. They can’t take me. No. Not this guy. Stainless steel spike withdraws, giving way to the big, forgery of a smile stuck on a pretty nurse’s face. My eyes roll. The walls are a pastel blue - and I haven’t seen anything so pretty in such a long time.

The mirrored sunglasses of a dozen young suits. Ear buds planted in alert ears. Hands ready to fly through lapels at the first sign of—

Another pinch. Another stick of the needle. This chair is my home now. These four blue walls, my whole world. Ghastly chrome apparatuses. A confusing array of tools. A single window, the outside closed off from me by clinical white blinds. I gasp, and the pretty nurse hushes me with a slender finger pressed to nude lips. “Shh,” she says. “Everything’s going to be all right. You’re going to be just fine.” But I don’t believe her.

Trouble. There’s a quick silvery flash in the crowd of onlookers lining the street just as the old man’s glistening motorcade rounds the corner. Billowing fender flags and white wall tires. Gleaming lapel pins and a helmet of white hair. They told him not to take the convertible. They told him to keep himself behind glass.

This liquid is hot in my vein, and I can feel it travelling down my forearm and up through my bicep. Numbing. Anaesthetizing. Killing all sense as it goes. Entire arm is soon dead. Shoulder, useless. There’s a slight tickle of concern on the pretty nurse’s lips. She breathes in gently, filling her lungs, holding her breath. Her eyes meet mine before jumping away. She exhales shakily, withdrawing the spike from my vein.

That flash in the crowd. The young suits converge, wrestling the perpetrator to the ground. The old man glides by oblivious, smile on his face, hand waving in the air. The crowd is ecstatic. No-one seems aware of the struggle but me. A set of mirrored lenses spot me through the masses. Words are spoken into a lapel. In that instant, it was made very clear to me that I had just seen something that I wasn’t supposed to see.

“There, there. I told you everything was going to be all right.” The nurses words are soft, and her hand is patting me gently on the shoulder. She tousles my hair. “Nothing to it.” This chair is my new home. These four pastel blue walls are my whole world. “The doctor should be in to see you straight away. Until then we’ll monitor your vitals.”

A quick pursuit. A little resistance. A long drive to nowhere.

My jaw doesn’t clench anymore, or else it would be right now. My teeth don’t grind. My mouth doesn’t open. No. Not this mouth. And something tells me it won’t be doing much from this point forward. No eating – that’ll be handled intravenously. No singing – these lips have been patriotic enough. And certainly no talking. No. No talking. And I’m not even sure what I ever had to say in the first place.