Editor’s note: We’re looking for a variety of young voices to contribute to “Hits Different.” If you’d like to write a commentary, send it to Area Editor Jason Hennington at jason.hennington@granitemediapartners. com.
As a culture, we are deeply invested in tools that help us plan for the future; we believe we can make the unexpected become the expected. I am guilty of this. Calendars, planners and timers dictate how I spend my time.
I genuinely enjoy plotting out my months, weeks and days. It gives me a false sense of control over my life. However, this idea of “control” is actually a grand facade. If you think you don’t fall for this, then I ask: Have you ever made a New Year’s resolution?
Millions of Americans declare a resolution for the new year, essentially to plan what the upcoming 365 days will look like. People make promises like, “This will be the year I read more books, eat healthier, start a garden.” Yet we actually have absolutely no idea what will happen (as the pandemic has proven).
In essence, these hollow resolutions fill the deep void of uncertainty and worry we have about the future. You don’t really know what will happen to you tomorrow. Based on patterns and past experiences, you make your best prediction.
In reality, these predictions are the only thing keeping you from going crazy with the knowledge you know nothing about the days ahead.
Another example of this uncertainty involves the unexpected “lasts” of our lives. Have you ever noticed this phenomenon? We don’t always realize what our “last time” doing something is until it’s too late.
For instance, you might say goodbye to someone, just a “see-you-soon” kind of farewell, but you never get to be with them again after that. Or, take your last time sleeping in your own bed before you leave for college. Your parents might move in the meantime, and you never see the house you grew up in again.
Unexpected “lasts” can hurt.
For instance, I had a good friend in middle school named Anna. Her family was in the military, and her father was going to be deployed to Germany after she finished eighth grade. My class held a “going away” party for her on the last day of middle school. Next year we would start high school without her, and she would be on the other side of the planet. However, I and many of my friends had a reason to be optimistic.
Our school offered a guided educational trip across Europe that summer, and we had already signed up. The sojourn would take us through France, Poland and Germany. Anna was going to make arrangements to meet us for a day in Berlin. But we never went to Europe. The trip was scheduled for summer 2020, and the pandemic forced us to cancel.
Did the pandemic affect any of your plans in March 2020, creating some “last” moments for you that were unexpected? I remember being thrilled to walk out of my school on March 13, 2020, the day I learned in-person classes were suspended for six weeks due to COVID. I never would have imagined that I would not be able to walk back into a school building without a mask on my face for another two years.
Here’s the big takeaway: Don’t take things for granted. Show compassion to those around you. Anything could happen tomorrow; none of us know for sure. At the same time, don’t lose too much sleep about the “lasts” you weren’t expecting and that you can’t ever get back.
As the famous author Dr. Seuss put it, “Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.”
