"So now that you're graduated, what are your plans?"
I join my fellow graduates in the starry-eyed, blank stare. We blink. We respond, "That's a great question." Quick. Check the attentivity (I am aware that this is not a "real" word) of our audience before rambling into our long monologue of options that have only a 10% chance of happenstance.
Courtesy of
here
For the past 22 years of my existence, I've been riding the always ascending escalator of education. And now, I have been ceremoniously (remember that terribly long graduation ceremony with all its Pomp and Circumstance) dumped off the top of this escalator of education. I thought this education was going somewhere. Now, I'm left milling around in a vacant warehouse that leads to everywhere (ever hear the overly-optimistic admonition "the whole world is open to you"?). If the whole world is in fact open to me, where are all the employers beckoning me and travel agencies offering to fly me around the world? Oh, I see them...over there getting swarmed by other college graduate hopefuls. Hmm. Okay. Well, I could crawl through all the feet to get to Dream Employers and Travelers...or I could do something else...
Huh. What's this? I'm looking down at my feet to see bits of paper all over this echoing warehouse full of recent grads trying to find where the whole world is open. I pick one up.
"Meet Mr. Right, Get Married right out of school."
I pick up another.
"Graduate with a job offer to Random House."
And another.
"Become a teacher."
Bits of dreams scattered around this warehouse where all dreams are supposed to come true, but it only appears that these dreams have been discarded--left behind to be crushed under foot.
Welcome to Life. Dream Crusher. Reality Mover.
Depressing, right? So now that my dreams have been crushed and my plans disintegrated, where do I go from here? And I'm wandering around staggered from the sudden lack of upward climb that has been dragging me through life's existence for years--now, what.
All along. There's been no plan. My parents didn't have a plan. Ha. That's why my dad's maxim is "one day at a time." That totally makes sense.
So what's my plan? Hmmm. I'm going to get married tomorrow. To who? Eh. Whatever. One day at a time. Maybe I'll go back to school or nanny...or dance in the rain...or something. I'll do something. Nope, I'm not worried. Everyone's making it up as they go. I will, too.
So my plan. I have no plan.
