Planning for A Future

“Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans” ~ John Lennon


I'm a compulsive planner. I have plans for a whole range of things in my personal life. I could tell you about my 4 children - 2 boys and 2 girls - their names Isabella, Evelyn, Sawyer and Connor. I could tell you about the nursery i made for the girls - sweet pea green walls with a white chair runner and varying shades of pink vertical stripes below the chair runner. But they don't exist....


My bridesmaids are going to wear yellow silk dresses with a cowl back. My flowers will be lilies - i'm a big fan of stargazer lilies. My centrepieces are going to be large martini glasses with those hydra beads in them and cascading flowers and an led light inside the glass, all on top of a circular mirror to reflect the light onto the whole table. But i'm not engaged....or even in a relationship.

I have a compulsion to know what is going to happen - to try and plan for everything, even those things over which I have little control. I think this is one of the things that drew me to drama and the theatre. Now i'm not talking about improvisational theatre - that i have never been a fan of. I don't like being put on the spot and the pressure to be funny makes me less funny than i usually am. I'm talking about being in a play.


Everything is so perfectly planned when getting ready for a performance. Entrances and exits are timed to a T. Each person knows their lines and if one should forget then everyone else knows where we need to be to get that person back on track. This is possible because we already know the ending and the journey, no matter what bumps happen when the curtain rises, is always going to end in the same way. it lends a sense of security that is so often missing from the real world.


Now for someone who is such a planner you might be wondering then why does she have that running problem....I'm not really sure about that myself.


I can plan for the future but planning a specific future with someone is a lot harder - probably because I can't control their actions.


I recently found myself in a relationship and I was actually planning for the two of us. That is something i haven't done with another person since somewhere back in 2006 when the world crumbled around me.


And for the first time, in so long, it wasn't me that prevented the planning. I was ok with it, strangely ok with it. My girlfriends were scratching their heads at my odd ease with this relationship i had stumbled into.


I know that i plan far far.....far ahead because it's safe. It doesn't impact anything right now and they really are just pipe dreams - possibilities - a girl's fairytale hopes. The details change all the time and i am in complete control of every one of those changes....but it's not as satisfying as it once was.


I think i'm finally in a place where i want to plan a future with someone and I don't want those plans to solely exist as moments within my imagination. I think i need more..


I think i'm finally growing up...and while i'm so happy that i'm ready for all of that again, i find myself a little bit sad that it's not as easy to keep my mind content by merely imagining the details of my future home out in the 'burbs.