What's the Plan, Stan?

I was going to use this blog to talk about the last week.  I was going to tell you all about my Dad and the stupid-fucking Cancer that insists on staying here even though it was not invited and nobody wants it.  I have been thinking about Cancer a lot actually and I have come to a lot of conclusions about Cancer that someday I will go into detail about.  Cancer, my friends, is a sociopath and like all sociopaths it is equal parts fascinating and horrifying.  But I am not going to talk about Cancer right now because, and I think I can speak for all of us involved, we are tired of talking about fucking Cancer. And all of the things that come with it.  The medicines and the decisions, the hopes and the fears and my Dad caught in all of it.  It's ugly and it is unfair and in the words of the great Keith Redden Harris, greatest human of all time, best Dad on the planet, "Who needs it?".

I thought I would use this blog to talk about something else.  Because please, let's talk about anything else.  Like baseball.  Let's talk about baseball.  Today is the last day of the regular season and despite the fact that all 30 teams were given 162 chances to decisively win?  In at least two games it has come down to today's final game to decide some things.  And even then the only decision that may be made today is that another game has to be played tomorrow to make an actual decision.  And despite the fact that the MLB has made plans for Wild Card games on Tuesday and Wednesday if the A's and the Mariners tie and/or the Bucs and the Redbirds tie?  They have to play first before the WC game can be played, and I love it.  Because it is basically the baseball universe saying to all of the planners: Fuck you.  And your plans.  And that makes me laugh because that in fact, is true in all of life.

I was raised by planners.  If it is possible for four distinct people to have one exact thing in common and all end up being someone's parent, either directly or indirectly, my four parents are plantastic.  I can hear my Mom now saying: "Megan, you have to have a plan." Not only was I raised by planners, my job entails helping other people figure out a plan.  Case managers are life-coordinators and that involves A LOT of planning.  I spend all day helping people plan, helping people with their plan, re-planning, updating the plan, getting people so we can fulfill the plan.  Planning certainly has its place and I have gotten pretty good at it, in my own life and the lives of others.

What I am discovering in the second half of my life is that I am also getting pretty good at the 163 game.  The one I did not plan for at all.  I have learned through sobriety and honesty and asking for help that when the bottom drops out, and it is only a matter of time before it does, I will land on my feet and I will know what to do. I have learned that, other than death, there is nothing that I cannot survive.  That I can trust my own judgement.  That a lot of times there are simply no "right" answers. That all I can do is do my best, and that the only person my best has to be good enough for, is me.  I have learned that I am a good person and that even though I fuck up, and I do all of the time, my intentions are good and that is what matters.  I have learned that, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, I can survive this, and the next thing.  With or without a plan.

So I am going to go about my plans for the day.  I wish you good luck with your plans for the day.  I wish you joy and peace and a reprieve from any of the hard stuff you may be dealing with.  If you survive your plans and I do too and everything goes as planned?  Maybe I will see you tomorrow. 

xoxoxox