10 years ago, if you’d asked me what I’d expected to do with the rest of my life, I’d have probably told you that I’d be backpacking across the Aboriginal jungle or a commentator on E! news. I am quite certain that had I been able at that age, to see a 5 minute snapshot of my life now, as it actually turned out, I would never have believed it. Not for one tiny second.

We went out to lunch today, and by nature of either the restaurant accoustics or the fact that this chick had the most amazingly grating voice known to man, we got to overhear nearly a full conversation of a girl of probably 22 or 23. Really, by conversation, I mean monologe (I actually began too feel sorry for her friend, as this chick spent the whole 35 that we were there talking about herself. I almost told her to go get herself a blog. OH SNAP!). And boy, OH boy was this girl deluded.

She had it all planned out: where she was going to live, when she was going to be married (despite just “dicking around with this guy,” her actual words), the age in which she would have kids. I mean, no words can describe just how sure she was of the way her life was going to turn out. It was sort of cute, but it completely dated her.

The way that I see it, growing up is mainly just letting go to the notion that you have control over a whole lot of anything in life. I’m not trying to factor free will out of the equation here, but over the past couple of weeks, as I’ve watched several good friends of mine get shit on by circumstances completely outside of their control, it’s served to remind me yet again, that most illusions of control are merely that: illusions.

Surely, but surely you can control yourself, can’t you? To some degree, perhaps, but I’m sure that the most jealous person cannot stop themselves from coveting, no matter how hard they try. Even emotions, it seems, are almost impossible to control. You don’t control who you love, nor can you control who you hate, or who loves or hates you. Sure, William Blake claims, “The cut worm forgives the plow,” but he neglects to say when and at what cost.

As we left the restaurant, both slightly bedraggled and sore, I asked Dave if he believed that I had ever been as naive. He looked at me, laughed, and told me that he was sure that I had been even more so. This I can accept, but I cannot imagine that I would have spent the entirity of a lunch with a friend monologing about myself. Even at 17, I’m pretty sure that I knew how boring that must have been for anyone but myself.