Planning

My train's a little late tonight, it's only now rumbling its way past the house. (Those of you who don't know, on the other side of the street I live on, down over the bank [and by bank, I mean sheer drop off] there's a set of train tracks that are active - namely, there's a train that goes by every night. Sometimes more than one a night, and it makes the house shake a little. Oh, and you can definitely hear it.)

You guys know me (or if you don't, just act like you do, and that'll be fine, too) and you know how much I avoid the word plan. And the word goal, too. I don't like them. They give me this feeling of structure, and while I'll freely admit that I like (and probably need) a healthy dose of structure in my life, I also really enjoy my flexibility in just going where my wandering feet happen to take me. I like that bit of spontaneity in my life. Not to mention I have a really difficult time planning next week in advance, never mind next month and possibly the next five years of my life.

With that being said, it's time for me to admit that, despite my ill will toward the words plan and goal, not only do I now have one, I actually have both.

This, right here, is where the universe implodes.

What's really interesting is during the first two years of my college career, I kept putting after-graduation plans to the back of my head with the idea that it wasn't time for me to think about that stuff yet. Two years later, I'm at the beginning of my junior spring, and now it's time for me to more or less think about what I've been trying to put off thinking about for two years. I won't get into the turn-around that I've gone through (though I will mention I get between seven and eight hours of sleep per night, no matter the day of the week [so if that doesn't tell you how much I've currently got my shit together, I don't know what will]) but I will say that Louise is now capable of looking at the forest and not getting lost in the trees.

That's a macro versus micro type of analogy, but basically says that there is not only a bigger picture, but Louise is actually seeing it. In technicolor, too.

One of the first things to come out of this is that I've realized I'm just as good as everyone else. And if I'm not, at the moment, then there's no reason why I shouldn't be. There's no reason that says I'm not capable of being as good as everybody else. There's nothing that says I need to stick with the system that half-assed worked for two years and let that continue to be me.

No, thank you, we'll give this a whirl, and considering that I actually sleep at night now, I'm thinkin' it's workin' pretty damn well.

The second thing to happen is that, and irony of irony for me, things don't always go according to their first plan. When you factor in the only luck I have is bad luck (Murphy loves me, and I don't care which Murphy you pick, in this case) it's no surprise that the tentative idea of going to grad school somewhere (tentatively John Jay in NYC) the fall following graduation has kind of shifted.

Grad school is still the idea, it's just been put off to the spring following graduation, or the fall a year from graduation.

Namely because I don't have an entire free semester in which to do my student teaching before I graduate. Not if I want to graduate with a degree. So what the Colleges allow you to do is take a ninth semester and use that as your student teaching semester. You graduate, then find someplace to live (though my education adviser and I are going to see what we can swing, and we'll probably get a pretty good deal in the process) and do your student teaching.

At this moment, that's the plan. How I went from having no plan to having one that's cementing itself more and more each day is beyond me. I still can't believe it, and I'm the one actually living it.

Damn terrifying, truthfully.

The bottom line is that, when you start to figure out what you want to do, you start to plan things. You start to absently set goals that become a little more concrete the closer you get to them, and while I enjoy flying by the seat of my pants just as much as the next wandering Sagittarius, the idea that there's a bigger picture? It's a really nice motivator.

When I say, right now, that life is good? I mean it. I really, honestly, mean life is good.

And if you wanna bring up the fact that it took me roughly three years to figure out, well, to that I say better late than never.

P.S. - For those of you currently living in the path of the snowstorm - whether you're beginning to get the mass amount we're supposed to get - be careful. We're not invincible. Maybe tomorrow is the day to stay in, make some hot chocolate (or coffee) and curl up with a good book. If you need one to borrow, I have everything from quantum mechanics to Terry Pratchett. But please, honestly do remember to travel safely if you absolutely need to, and if you're curled up somewhere with a good book, all nice and toasty, remember me slogging through the snow on the way to class because HWS hasn't quite heard of the concept of a "snow day" yet. Oh well. There's always next winter.